


Love Never Dies: Unchained

by Crimson_Coin



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms, Love Never Dies - Lloyd Webber, Phantom of the Opera - Lloyd Webber
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drama, F/M, Family, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:00:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 31,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24636454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson_Coin/pseuds/Crimson_Coin
Summary: Shattered and panicked from his impulsive bet with the Opera Ghost, Raoul de Chagny knows that he has one last chance to try and mend his broken family and his fractured marriage. Despite years of distance and emotional withdrawal, does he have the courage to leap into the abyss for the family that he loves, or will he drown in drink and self-pity?Haunted by the past, Christine must finally face the consequences of her choices. As darkness threatens to consume everyone she loves, will she reach for the light once more or succumb to the darkness forever?(An alternate retelling of the second act of Love Never Dies.)
Relationships: Raoul de Chagny/Christine Daaé
Comments: 68
Kudos: 43





	1. Chapter 1

What a fool he was!

Raoul adjusted the tie of his formal attire as he climbed the stairs to Christine’s dressing room. Why did he let that lunatic trap him into making such a ridiculous bet? Christine was not a prize to be won. That game ended a decade ago when they escaped the phantom’s lair. 

Or so he thought. For it seemed that his betrothed had other ideas after fleeing the underworld. She had chosen to stay with the ghost then, and certainly in no way could she have expected to have been released from his clutches. Once free, she and Raoul had escaped together to a life of daylight, but she was still drawn to darkness, to the night, to hell. She had laid with the devil incarnate, and it seemed, she had also carried his child. Though she had been guided to the light, released from the clutches of madness, she still turned back and returned to the Ghost.

Raoul wasn’t sure he wanted to believe it, that Christine could betray him like that. She was the only woman he ever loved, the only woman he ever desired. And even when she refused to accept him into her bed for the last six long years, he remained loyal to her. 

He remembered those first few years of marriage with a positivity that he was not sure it deserved. Her pregnancy had been difficult, and during the first few months of Gustave’s life, she had been inattentive, withdrawn, and lost. During that year, she had accepted his touches as if they were more a chore than a desire, and he now wondered if she was comparing him to another. If he had failed to please her.

Did she shun him because she yearned for another? As those first few years passed, her interest in him and their marriage had waned, though she focused more intently on their son.

The year Gustave turned two, Raoul turned to drink. He drank away the failures of his business capital, and drank away the withdrawal of his wife’s inattention, and finally, he drank away his inadequacies. She returned to singing six months later, mostly because they needed the money.

Despite the gossip, the de Chagny family was not destitute, but finances were tighter than they should have been. It didn’t help that Raoul’s only skill seemed to be cards, but even in that venture, when he failed, he failed spectacularly. It was because of Christine’s career that they still had clothes on their backs, a roof over their head, and food in their bellies. Drink in his belly.

Pausing at the top of the stairs, he thought back to the days and nights he wasted wallowing in self-pity, caving to the whisperings of their peers that taunted and emasculated him. If he were a stronger and better man, he would not have let their words affect him. If he were a stronger and better man, he could give up the drink for his family. If only he were many things ...

Frustrated, Raoul raked a hand through his hair, combing the strands back from his eyes. He should have known better than to act on emotion after the Opera Ghost revealed that caveat of his wife’s transgression. He should have known better the moment he saw that reviled monster and left the bar without a word. He should have done a great many things over the last decade. 

Would he be able to convince Christine to leave with him now? What did he have to offer her to make his case? He was a shell of the man who pledged himself to her ten years ago with romantic gestures and intimate whispers. Did that Raoul even exist anymore?

He opened the door to his wife’s dressing room and stepped inside. He froze at the sight, and suddenly a decade of time faded away. He saw Christine as radiant and beautiful as she had been those many years ago, and in that moment, gone were the strains of their present and the weights of their past. Gone was the disappointment, the disinterest, the uncertainty and fear. She was angelic. Shame that the term had been sullied.

Christine glanced at him, and she tensed. When did his wife start to fear him? Had he become such a monster over these years that she thought he could ever physically harm her or their son? 

Their son.

His gaze shifted to Gustave, and a pang of betrayal gripped his heart. Was it true? Was the child actually the Phantom’s son? Did it even matter? Raoul had risked his family for the sake of his own pride, prodded to action in a rage of jealousy because of the accusations made by a manipulative madman.

What was best for them? For Christine. He felt sorrow for their tumultuous marriage, shame for his own failings as a husband and father, and wondered if he even deserved one last chance to make up for all of his sins. Why had he accepted that ridiculous bet?

Gustave looked to the door and smiled brightly at Raoul, dragging the Vicomte from his melancholy. “Father! Doesn’t Mother look lovely tonight?”

“Indeed, she does,” Raoul sighed, and he offered a genuine smile. Perhaps even charming. “As lovely as she looked the very first time I came to her dressing room.”

Surprised by the compliment, Christine seemed taken aback, but the shock was quickly replaced with warmth. “And look at you, Raoul. You look just like that handsome boy in the opera box. The one who would always toss me a single red rose.”

Had he been so monstrous that even a compliment was such a shock to her? Ah, how far he had descended. He did not deserve her love or her forgiveness. He ached at the loss.

Kneeling down beside Gustave, he took the boy’s shoulders firmly and said, “Please, Gustave, if you don’t mind, will you wait outside a while?”

Hopeful, Gustave asked, “May I go exploring? By myself?”

Christine smiled gently at her son and rested a hand on his head. “Yes, but stay backstage, my dear. When I’m finished, meet me here.”

“I will!” Gustave called as he charged out the door.

There were so many things Raoul wanted to say to her. To plead with her to leave now with him, renege on the contract and flee with him to a ship set for France. To ask her to kiss him again like she used to all those years ago when they thought of only new love and dreamed of a blissful future. To beg her to love him and return to his arms forever.

But Raoul knew that he deserved none of those outcomes.

Any youthful and hopeful thoughts he may have had upon entry dissipated and were replaced with the heavy truths of the present. Meeting her eyes, he smiled sadly. “I have been horrible for years, haven’t I?”

“Raoul …” she sighed with a placating expression.

“Please, don’t deny it,” He said, holding up his hand to stop her reply. “Can we be honest with each other now? For once? And not live in this half-world of unspoken truths that has been our life for so long.”

When she did not respond, he turned his head to look at himself in the mirror. He wondered when he started to look so tired, so haggard. Reaching up, he traced the pronounced wrinkle line in his brow.

Christine shifted her weight; his eyes darted to hers, watching her through the reflection. Sighing, his hand lowered. “Are we at that point now where there is not even comfort in silence? Do I make you so nervous?”

She held her hands to her stomach and worried her fingers. “I’m just not sure what you want me to say.”

He knew what he wanted to say. He wanted to ask her why she no longer looked at him as if she loved him, and wanted to know when that happened. He wanted to ask her why she had denied his touch for so long. He wanted to know where everything went wrong. Was it him? Her? Perhaps both.

But they were beyond the point for answers to those questions, to dissect what went wrong in their marriage, their romance, their bed chamber. He swallowed that bitterness, and could not help but wonder where it was that he lacked and that monster excelled.

“Raoul,” she whispered.

Her trembling plea brought him back to the present, and he felt both self-loathing and frustration at the obvious unsettled expression on her face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “For everything. For not being what you hoped or desired. For failing to live up to what I promised.”

Averting his eyes from the mirror, he turned to face her. “This morning I was in a bar. I know, you are not surprised, and from your expression, quite disgusted. But as I was there, drowning in my own self pity, I was visited by a mutual friend of ours — Mr. Y up to his old games again. I fell right into his trap, and whether from the drink or my own misplaced arrogance … hmmf, perhaps both, I accepted a bet. About you, Christine.”

Frowning, Christine stepped back from him. “Me?”

“Yes,” he answered. “He set the wager that if you sing his song that I will leave for Paris alone, leave you forever. But if I could convince you to come with me, to not sing the song, or leave and never look back, then he would pay our debts in full … my debts, and leave us be. And in my idiocy, I accepted.”

There was a long minute of silence as she reflected on that, and Raoul saw the thoughts playing out on her face — shock, confusion, hurt, and then finally anger.

“Raoul,” she whimpered. “How could you?” Tearing, she frantically wiped the moisture away, smudging the kohl that outlined her luminous glacial-blue eyes. “How could you! As if I don’t have a choice as to what I want from life. Or without a thought as to what my needs are. Or Gustave’s! Did you even think about Gustave?”

He chuckled, shaking his head. “Ah yes. Gustave. Don’t worry, my Dear, Mr. Y told me all about Gustave. And from how the color just drained from your cheeks, I take it that means there is truth to his words.”

He wasn’t expecting the confirmation to hurt so much. Shaking his head, he turned away from her and jerked out the chair at her vanity. He sank into it, watching her. 

Christine paced away from him, her hand to her mouth. 

He waited to see if she would say anything at all. He waited for an explanation, perhaps some kind of bumbling response. A denial. Hell, even a taunt, at this point. But instead she said nothing and simply stood with her back to him.

Leaning forward, he rested his elbows on his knees. “Was it consensual?”

“It was.”

And again, it hurt more than he expected.

Resigned, he pushed to his feet and approached her. When he touched her shoulder, she flinched. Undeterred, he turned her to face him.

Even in her sorrow, she was beautiful. As beautiful as the day he saw her on stage at the Opera Populaire, as beautiful as she was when they professed their love on the rooftop months later. How was it that time had never touched her? 

No, time may not have ravaged or aged her features, but her eyes glistened with unspoken sadness. How long had she been so unhappy? And what idiot was he to have been so blind to it for this long?

With tenderness, Raoul stroked his wife’s cheek with the backs of his fingers. “I want you to sing, Lotte. I want you to sing like you never have before, and take the audience in your hand and have them beg for more. New York will fall in love with you, as they should.”

Holding her emotional gaze, he trailed a single finger along the line of her jaw. “And then take the obscene amount of money he has offered you, and leave. Leave me. Leave him. Leave behind the poisons of your past that have done nothing but haunt you. His manipulations. My failures.”

“No, Raoul,” she softly protested. “Wait.”

“I’ll give you anything you need, Christine,” he released her and reached into the inside pocket of his suit, pulling out a money clip with a small number of bank notes. “Sing, get your bank notes, and run. Run from all of this. This fevered nightmare. My inexcusable nonsense. All of it.”

With a sharp nod, he stepped back from her, holding out a hand to keep her in place. “I’ll keep an eye on Gustave while you sing and bring him back here. He’ll be safe. Then, you do what you must, Christine. You deserve to be happy.”

He walked to the door, and even though she made no sound to stop him, he still hesitated. With his hand on the handle, he looked back at her. Beautiful, ethereal, and quite frankly, shocked.

There was so much he wanted to know in that instant, in that last moment before he knew she would be gone forever. Her distance during the first year of marriage was all the more clear now that the truth of Gustave’s paternity had come to light. And now that Raoul knew of her clandestine affair with the man who obviously earned her love and appeared to have sired her child, he wondered if their marriage could have succeeded at any point.

“Say it,” she pleaded, softly, an uncertainty in her eyes as she took a single step towards him. She clutched the money clip to her breast. “Whatever you are thinking, please, say it.”

Desperate for an answer, and yet unsure if he wanted the truth, he gathered his courage to ask. “Did you ever love me?”

“Oh yes,” she breathed and the money clip dropped to the floor as she rushed towards him. Her arms wrapped around him from behind and she pressed her cheek to his back. “Yes, Raoul, I did.”

And his heart broke. Did. Past tense. Any hope that had lingered of a future between them vanished.

Closing his eyes and ready for the inevitable, he nodded and placed a hand over hers where they were clasped at his waist. He felt her shakey exhalation of breath, but was certain it was more out of fear than any other emotion.

Gently, he pried open her clasping grip and turned. Cupping her face in his hands, he memorized her. He memorized her elaborate swirling curls that were intricately pinned off her neck. He memorized her flawless skin, her vivid eyes, and her lips. Those lips that he so often craved and that she rarely let him taste.

He memorized her in that stunning dress with the intricately beaded design, and the way her hands rested so absently on his hips, as if in that single moment they were familiar with each other again. If they ever were. And in that last moment, he could not help himself. Leaning closer, his eyes closed and he dared to kiss her. It was slow, sweet, and savoring. He needed to memorize that one last thing — her taste.

She returned the kiss, her lips pursing against his, and Raoul felt her tremble, both her mouth and her body. He memorized that reaction as well, kidding himself that it was a genuine and emotional response to a man she loved.

When he took as much as he thought she would give, he eased back from her to look down into her glazed eyes. And he waited, hoping that perhaps she would say something. Give him some kind of sign that his assumptions were wrong, and there was still a love between them. Simmering, perhaps, but not extinguished. Something that they could build on. 

Christine reached up to touch her parted lips, and she watched him silently with an odd expression. Shaking her head, she searched his gaze and a myriad of emotions played across her features, none of which Raoul could identify.

When she still said nothing, he sighed and averted his eyes, turning to the door. Heartache ravaged him, but it was what he deserved for being so careless over the long years. “I will see that Gustave is here.” He opened the door, and paused as a final expression of love danced on his tongue.

He resisted its utterance and exited the room.


	2. Chapter 2

Christine watched as her husband closed the dressing room door behind him, and too late to stop him, she reached out to splay her palm on the pristine white wood. “Raoul,” she sighed and closed her eyes, ducking her head.

Her lips tingled from his kiss, and her body still trembled at the sensation of his touch. When was the last time he had touched her that way, kissed her with such reverence? When was the last time she even let him try?

Their marriage had been doomed to fail from the very beginning, and all because of her decisions. When she fled the safety of the city to seek the darkness of the underworld and submitted to the passion-filled night music, she had thrown away all of the trust and love that Raoul had offered her. That she enjoyed those hours in Erik’s arms and was willing to follow him wherever he would lead them only made her betrayal worse.

When she awoke to find herself alone and abandoned, she had sobbed, and then returned to the only place she could. To Raoul.

Where else was she to go? What else could she do? Terrified and alone, she married the Vicomte in a muted ceremony, and she remembered quite vividly Raoul’s beaming smile, his adoring gaze, and the gentle and sweet way that he touched her that night. It was such a contrast, and one she never should have made. As much as she loved the frantic and rough passion with Erik, she also adored the reverent worship from Raoul.

Overcome by guilt, she had struggled to cope with her deceit, and Raoul had been so attentive and sweet during that first year of their marriage, even as her belly swelled. As the months passed, she still ached with the betrayal, and after the birth of her son, she descended into a world of sadness and despair.

The depression ravaged her. Her moods shifted between frustration or anger to abject sorrow with no catalyst. She wept herself to sleep those endless nights, if she could even sleep. On most nights, sleep had eluded her, and so she simply wallowed in her own sadness. Nothing alleviated the milaise. 

She had even shunned her son, unable to comfort his cries or forge a maternal bond. She hated herself for that weakness, that failing. It took nearly six months for that shroud of sorrow to lift from her, and as she roused to the emotions for her son, she feared that it was too late. Could she ever make up for her failings as a mother? 

The moment she felt the stirrings of love for her son, Christine had seized it and refused to let go. Gustave was all that mattered, and she had to prove to herself and the world that she was a good mother. That she loved her son.

By the time she looked to Raoul again those months later, he was a shell of the man she had married, drowning in drink and self-loathing. As their finances grew more strained, he fell deeper into drink and continued to withdraw. When he yelled at a three-year-old Gustave for being no more than a rambunctious young boy, Christine vowed to protect her son from whatever monster resided within Raoul. A monster she never suspected was there.

He withdrew further, as did she, fearful of him. Would he strike out at them, beat them with his rage? She had heard of the dangers of drunks and out of a sheer will to survive, she shielded Gustave as best she could.

Raoul grew more agitated as he drowned in whiskey. She smelled it on him often, and on the few occasions when he kissed her, she tasted it as well. No matter the hour of the day. The sourness lingered on him, nauseated her, and their relationship continued to strain. And yet he never raised a hand to them.

Christine wondered that if perhaps she were more attentive to him, more understanding that maybe he would not have turned to alcohol to dull whatever struggles he endured. Was it wrong of her to turn him from her bed, to distance herself and her son and leave Raoul to his own suffering? Should she have tried harder to pull him back when he floundered?

She had feared that the man she loved those years ago was gone for good, consumed by the demons of his addiction. She wondered now if she was wrong.

Closing her eyes, Christine rested her forehead against the door. That evening, she had caught glimpses of the Raoul she had loved. She feared that perhaps her love for him had wilted, beaten down by his temper and addiction, by her own fears and guilt over the past, but she wondered now if that were true.

Was it possible to love two men? For so long, she was not sure, but in that moment she felt that the answer was yes. 

She loved Erik for what he had given her during those lonely years after her Father died. Erik was there when she yearned to learn music, and he cultivated her voice and her talent. He filled the gaping void left behind by the death of her father. He seduced her with his music, with his passion, and his mind. And despite his violence, his viciousness — after all, he was a murderer — she loved him still. She had stopped trying to justify those emotions years ago, and simply accepted them as they were. Flawed, faulted and unjustifiable, but still real and ever-present.

Yet, she loved Raoul too. She loved the boy who was her dearest friend in childhood, who shared his days with her through fantasy and imagination. She loved the boy who snuck away with her to the beach and teared at the thought that they would part forever when he returned to Paris. She loved the boy who had the courage to kiss her that day as the salty ocean air whipped through their hair. Raoul, her first kiss and first love.

But she loved him as more than that. She loved Raoul, the man, who burst into her life after singing her first lead like an explosion of nostalgia, warmth, and hope. He was the one who held her when she trembled in fear. He was the one who first pledged to love her and share his world with her. He was the one who listened to her wants, her dreams, and fantasized of how exciting their life would be as she pursued her career after they wed. A shocking and progressive support, she soon discovered, as the wealthy classes and families looked down on not only their marriage from the start, but also her continued career. Yet, that never mattered to him.

Raoul was the man who risked his life to chase after her into the darkened sewers, knowing she was afraid, and he willingly dove into the unknown, offering his life to free her from an impossible choice. He was the man who held her in the first year of their marriage, comforting her through a grief he did not understand. And despite all of their trials and strains, yes, she loved him still. 

Catching a glimpse of that man again just moments ago tore at her heart, and she craved to have him back. Not the Raoul who flailed unmoored in a sea of anger and sorrow, but the Raoul who was always selfless, honest, true, and devoted. Should she reach for him again? Could she toss the rope and pull him back ashore? Did she even want to?

“Why do you weep?”

Christine startled at the tenor voice, and she jumped away from the door, holding a hand to her breast. She spotted Erik at the far end of her room. The only entrance to her room was the door through which Raoul exited; she should not be surprised there was another way in. It was Erik’s style, after all.

“Do you weep for him?” He asked with a snarl. “For a drunk?”

Her heart hardened, and she replied, coldly. “For all of us.”

“He does not deserve your pity,” he snapped with a firm shake of the head, and gestured towards the door. “Or your loyalty.”

She repressed the instinctual reaction to defend her husband. Stalking away from the door, she stood behind her make-shift vanity, keeping distance between them. “Did you propose a wager with my husband about me?”

He took a step closer, and when he answered her, his voice oozed with a soothing calm. “Christine …”

She stepped back, lifting her hand. Shaking her head, she interrupted him. “Answer my question.”

He stayed where he was, and his gaze narrowed, his mouth firm. “Your husband is a useless drunk who has done nothing but weigh you down. What happiness have you had, Christine? From what I see, it has been none. He is a chain around your neck, dragging you to the abyss.”

Christine schooled any reaction. Whether there was truth to his words or not was irrelevant. Erik had no right to make a judgement or assessment of her marriage or her life. He had no idea what she had been through, what she felt, and why she made the choices that she did.

He approached her again, his melodic voice, hypnotic. “I saw how he was with Gustave when you first arrived. How he was with you. What kind of husband and father has he been? What has he offered you these ten years? Our son is afraid of him. You are afraid of him.”

Outstretching his arms, he smiled. “Look what can be yours. The beauty. The comfort. The music.  _ My _ music. It calls to you, Christine. I see it in your eyes.”

He was right, but Christine was not about to admit it to him. Instead, she pressed. “Did you make a bet with my husband on whether or not I would sing that piece?”

“It is only further proof that he does not know you,” he replied, and showed her an elaborate sapphire drape necklace as if he conjured it from the air. He always was gifted with slight of hand tricks.

Christine had never seen a piece so lovely, so intricate, and so expensive. The sapphires were pristine perfection, surrounded by sparkling diamonds and inlaid within shimmering silver. She never knew circuses and vaudeville shows could be so lucrative.

He circled the vanity, and slowly fastened it around her neck. “Of course, I challenged him. He thinks that you can so easily turn from me and from my music. You and I both know that isn’t true. I know you have been yearning for something more. That a part of you wonders what could have been. What should have been between you and I. And our son.” 

At the mention of Gustave, Christine hardened, and her eyes narrowed. She stepped back from him. “My son. You mean the boy that you threatened within minutes of our reunion. Tell me, Erik, if I had refused to sing your aria, what would have you done to him?”

With a furrowed brow, he shook his head. “None of that matters now. He is mine. Did you hear his music, Christine? He played a song he had written, and it was then that I knew it must be true. Before you ever confirmed my suspicions.”

“So his musical talent must be because of you?” she asked, incredulous. “As if I have none? Or my father.” She held up a hand to stop his retort. “And I know what I said to you about him, but the truth is that I honestly cannot say for certain who his father is. Yes, I laid in your arms, but the next day I married Raoul. And we consummated our marriage that evening.”

Sighing, she shook her head at his obvious annoyance. “Truly? Are you shocked that I shared my bed with Raoul. I married him, Erik, did you think that we would not be physically intimate? So answer me, please, what would you have done to my son if I had said no? Would you have killed him?”

“Why would you wound your angel?” he asked. “Do not dangle my son in front of me only to take him away. Come, Christine. Sing my aria as only you can.”

Christine stiffened when Erik grabbed her hand and turned her wrist upwards. While holding her eyes, he pressed a warm and intimate kiss to her wrist. She shivered.

He grinned, a wicked gleam in his eye. “I cannot wait to hear you sing for me once more.”

She watched him leave, and any exhilaration she may have felt at one time to his touch or his presence, even a day ago, was gone. The terror and the fear of her youth resurfaced, and just as then, it was not for herself. For despite all of Erik’s romantic gestures and refrains, he did not assuage her fears that the threat towards her son was not murder.


	3. Chapter 3

Gustave and Miss Giry were missing, and no matter where Raoul had looked, he could not find them. Scouring the backstage area, he found little help from most of the performers. It was only when his frantic searching and incessant questions bordered on annoying and disruptive did someone point him towards the pier.

And so Raoul raced down the boardwalk of Coney Island, calling for his son as he searched for the pier. What did Meg Giry intend to do with Gustave, and why would the boy follow her so willingly? As the fabled pier came into view, he saw two figures walking the length towards the edge, and one was the size of a child.

His pace quickened. “Gustave!”

When he reached the pier, his suspicions were confirmed. Meg Giry stood near the edge with a firm hold on Gustave, dangling the young boy very near the ledge.

“Meg,” he called, outstretching his hands as if that could stop her.

She turned wild eyes upon him. “Don’t come closer! Stay where you are!”

He froze, his eyes focused on Gustave a moment before shifting to the panicked woman. “Please, don’t harm the boy.”

“The boy,” she laughed. “The boy. Everyone cares about the boy. What of the boy? Even you care about the boy when you have no more reason to than I!”

“He is innocent in all of this,” Raoul said, calmly. “Whatever pain you feel, I understand. Believe me I do.”

“You have no idea what I feel, Monsieur,” Meg scoffed. “Don’t presume to feel anything on my behalf.”

“That’s fair,” he soothed. “You are right. I don’t know what you’ve been through, or what brought this on. What I do know is that Gustave is not the reason you feel the way you do.”

“Isn’t he?” She snarled. “He is everything you and I could never offer them! That they would never want from us!”

“Don’t say that,” he said, slicing his hand at the air. “It isn’t true.”

“It is, Monsieur,” Meg replied, and her eyes teared. “I have given everything for him. I was the one who worked for the capital to launch this venture. I was the one who ensured we had patrons investing. I gave everything … I sold everything for him.”

“And I cannot imagine what that true cost has been,” Raoul commiserated, hiding any shock or disgust at the admission. “But regardless of all of the betrayal we both may feel in this moment, none of it is Gustave’s fault. It is theirs. Place the blame where it should lie and not with those innocent of the actions of others.”

“Place the blame,” she scoffed. “And do you do that too, Monsieur? Do you place the blame where it should lie, or are you blinded in your allegiance to her?”

Raoul’s gaze shifted to Gustave then back to Meg. “I see her now. I do. But I see where I’ve gone wrong too.” He did not elaborate, loath to speak ill of Christine in front of her child. Desperate to defuse the situation, he continued, “I was blind in only this regard, but, Meg, I still love her anyway. And perhaps that makes me a fool and gullible, but so be it.”

“Gullible would be the word,” she shot back and glared at Gustave, shaking the boy by the collar to draw his attention. “He doesn’t even look like you. And you never assumed? Really?” She glared at Gustave as she pointed at Raoul. “That is not your father. Do you hear me? He is not your father.”

Terror-stricken, Gustave watched Meg with wide eyes and a trembling lip. He clawed at her arm, trying to loosen her grasp on his jacket.

“But he is still my son,” Raoul said.

“Don’t say that,” Meg snapped. “He is theirs, and she kept that detail from you. Didn’t she. Do you feel betrayed? Ignored? As if you are forever second in her eyes? Because you are. Just as I am invisible to him.”

Faced with such a blunt assessment, he exhaled slowly, ignoring the surging pain at the truth behind Meg’s words. “Maybe. I haven’t coped with that realization very well over these years. Perhaps, a part of me has always known what you say is true, even if I was not prepared to face it. But, Meg, punishing Gustave because of your pain is not the solution. And I can say that as a man who took out his frustrations on that innocent boy, and punished him for the pain that I endured. Suffering that was no fault of his own.”

Wiping at the tears that leaked from her eyes, Meg whimpered. “It’s not fair.”

“It’s not,” he agreed and dared to take a step forward. “We have no control over the actions or emotions of others. We can only control our own.”

As Meg’s resolve faltered, Raoul reached out a hand. He said nothing more, but instead waited. He heard Gustave’s frantic panting and was certain of the terror the young boy experienced, but he refused to look away from Gustave’s captor. When Meg reached a hand out and took a step away from the edge, Raoul smiled.

“Gustave!”

Raoul forced the smile to remain at Christine’s cry, though the sound was enough to draw Meg’s attention away. “Meg,” he called softly, and repeated her name multiple times as he tried to draw her gaze back towards him.

Meg’s face contorted, and she shook her head. Her fist tightened on Gustave’s jacket as she muttered to herself. Raoul did not dare look back over his shoulder to what she witnessed, but whatever it was drove her back towards the ledge.

Twisting at the waist, Meg tossed the boy over the edge of the pier, and closing her eyes, fell into the water after him.

“No!” Raoul yelled, and raced to the edge. He heard Christine’s wail of terror as he searched the darkened waters for any sign of Gustave or Meg. Inhaling deeply, Raoul leapt off the pier and tucked his arms close to his chest. He closed his eyes as he pierced feet-first through the waves.

Raoul breached the surface, shaking his head to whip the hair away from his eyes. “Gustave!” he called, searching the water’s surface for his son.

He dove and forced his eyes open, ignoring the burn of sand and salt, but the world was too dark. The moonlight too dim.

Surfacing again, he called, “Gustave!” He spun quickly in the water, and it was just in time to see a form sink beneath the waves, a small hand reaching for the sky.

He swam. With everything in him and overwhelmed by fear, he swam. Diving beneath the crashing waves, he searched desperately again. He felt the cloth then in his hand, and without hesitation, his fingers clenched.

A suit jacket.

Surfacing, he dragged the owner with him, praying it was his son and not some other poor soul tossed to the sea.

When he broke through to the waves, he turned his gaze to the form in his hands. “Gustave,” he sighed with relief, but the waves swallowed them again, slamming them into the pilings of the pier.

Gathering his son close, Raoul took the brunt of the impact with a grunt and then wrapped his arm around the boy to keep him topside. “I have you, Gustave,” he hushed as the boy coughed. “I have you.”

Gustave, panicked with fear, clutched at his father, weighing them down. Raoul struggled to keep them both afloat against the unrelenting waves. In the distance, he heard Christine’s cry of desperation, calling for her son, but he knew that she could not see them as they were hidden by the pilings.

“Gustave,” Raoul coaxed, gently. “I know you’re scared, but we have to swim to shore. I’m going to need you …” he spit out some sea water. “I’m going to need you to be brave, alright?”

Trembling, Gustave nodded.

“Okay, I need you to trust me and lay on your back. It’s alright, son. I have you. Don’t worry. Just push your hips up to the sky. Yes, just like that. I have you. See? Look at you, my brave boy, you’re floating.”

Easing his arm around his son’s body, Raoul swam to shore, bringing Gustave with him. “We’re just going to move with the waves. I know you’re cold. I’m cold too.” Glancing at his son’s face, he noted the blue lips, and the boy quaked uncontrollably.

“We’re almost there,” Raoul said. “Almost there. Listen to that? Keep your hips up. I can hear your mother. She’s calling your name. She must see us. Do you hear her, Gustave? Hold to her voice. We are almost there.”

As Raoul rode another wave towards the shore, he twisted in the water to plant his feet onto the sand. “Stand, Gustave. We’re here.”

Gustave scrambled and turned, falling to his face once and then again. Raoul helped the boy situate himself in the waves. Leading Gustave to shore, Raoul saw Christine in her beautiful gown, weeping at the shoreline.

She charged towards them, her arms open, and she dropped to her knees as Gustave plowed into her. Burying her face in the boy’s throat, she heaved with sobs; their son cried as well. The Opera Ghost shrugged out of his coat to drape it over Gustave, and then he rested a gentle hand on Christine’s shoulder.

Turning away from the scene, Raoul looked back out to sea and thought of the poor girl so ravaged and abused by the Ghost for ten long years. Determined that no other would fall victim to the phantom, he charged back into the sea.

Diving into the waves, he surfaced just past the break and swam out to sea back towards the pier pilings. He heard Christine’s voice again in the distance, muffled by the ocean, but what she said, he wasn’t sure.

“Meg!” he called out, swimming further from the pier, and he casually spit the water from his mouth as he panted. His clothes were heavy. and he struggled against the waves. Squirming out of his suit jacket, he gave it up to the sea.

“Monsieur!” a voice called from the pier and Raoul turned to look up.

Madame Giry stood at the end of the pier, pointing to the water a small ways away. She cried. “I saw her there, Monsieur! Please! Please!”

Raoul swam towards the spot and dove under the water. He searched, spinning beneath the waves. Surfacing for air, he inhaled deeply and then dove again. He saw a flutter then, something suspicious and he darted towards the figure. Near the breakpoint of the waves, swirling in the riptide, he saw her.

Sand scratched his eyes, and he closed them. Grabbing blindly, he found the collar of her blouse. Pulling her upward, he tucked his arm under her breasts, and holding her against his body, he surfaced. Gasping for air, he struggled against the riptide, swimming parallel to the shore. Once free, he swam using the swell of the waves to help him back to land.

When close enough to the shoreline, he stood and gathered the small dancer into his arms. Running on adrenaline and desperation, he carried her to the shore, ignorant to his body’s exhaustion.

He noted both Madame Giry and Christine rushing towards him with Gustave not far behind. Even the Ghost approached. Raoul yelled, “Fetch a doctor!”

He heard Christine’s gasp and Gustave’s whimpers, but there was no time to comfort them. Jerking roughly on the dancer’s body, he pressed his fist into her abdomen and forced her over his arm; water trickled from her mouth. Limp in his arms, he maneuvered her, and with Madame Giry’s help, he lay the young dancer on the ground. Turning her on her side, he pushed hard on Meg’s back.

More water dribbled from her mouth. Easing her onto her back, he tilted Meg’s head, pinched her nose closed, and opened her mouth. Ducking his head to hers, he breathed air into her lungs.

His training from the navy, so engrained all those years ago, rushed back to the forefront of his mind. Refusing to give up, he breathed into the small dancer’s mouth, as if by sheer will, he could force her breath. Unsure how much water she aspirated, he turned her onto her side again, in a desperate attempt to try and clear her lungs.

He heard Madame Giry’s voice, a whispered plea, and then Christine as she sternly said, “Do something! Go get a Doctor!” 

Raoul did not know to whom she addressed that, but in the moment, he didn’t care if it was Gustave, the Ghost, or a bystander. Someone needed to get help to the beach immediately.

Meg tensed and suddenly twitched. Crawling over her body, he put himself between his family and the dancer, hoping to block the morbid sight. “Gustave, go with your mother! Leave this place! You’ll catch cold.” He rolled Meg onto her back again.

Determined not to give up, he ducked his head to breath into Meg’s lungs. “Christine, go from here,” he repeated and ignored Madame Giry’s sobs as foam formed around Meg’s blue lips. He wiped the foamy mucus away. Glaring towards the boardwalk, he said, “Where’s … we need to get her to a doctor.”

Ducking his head, he breathed into her airway once then again and again before laying his ear to her chest. As more foam formed around her mouth, he turned her onto her side and rubbed roughly at her back.

Madame Giry rushed from the beach towards the wooden boardwalk and then waved towards Raoul. “Monsieur, please. He brings the carriage. Please!”

Raoul shifted then, and when Gustave coughed, he glanced behind him to the boy. “Don’t be afraid, Gustave. Don’t be afraid. Are you alright?”

Gustave nodded, clinging to Christine’s skirts though he uttered no words. Christine watched the child with fearful worry.

“Alright,” Raoul said calmly. “Do you feel any pain in your chest? Anything? No? Do you think you can be a very brave young man for me again? Good. I need you to help me with Miss Giry. I need you to make sure that her head stays nice and still on my arms. Do you think you can do that for me?”

Gustave scurried, more serious now with his task to help, and he knelt beside Raoul. “Is she going to be okay, Father?”

Raoul clenched his teeth, lifting the dancer. “Get her head, Gustave. That’s it. Alright, you don’t have to hold it. Just make sure she stays nice and steady. You don’t have to be afraid. Don’t be afraid of the foam. It looks very scary, I know, but don’t be afraid.”

The carriage stopped, and the door opened. The ghost stepped out, his expression unreadable as he looked at Meg in the Vicomte’s arms.

“Take her to the hospital,” Raoul commanded. “Somebody get in, and help me. She needs to stay on her side.”

Madame Giry leapt into the carriage and helped Raoul ease the dancer inside. When Meg’s body twitched again, he shifted to block the view from his family’s sight. Glancing to the ghost with narrowed eyes, he closed the door. “Go with her. She is like this because of you.”

The ghost glared at Raoul and hissed just loud enough for the Vicomte to hear. “You know as well as I that she’s …”

“Go!” Christine yelled at him. “What are you waiting for? Go!”

The Ghost looked at Christine and his demeanor softened. “I shall. I will return for you when she is settled.” He climbed up into the driver’s seat as the horseless-carriage moved down the boardwalk, sped up, and turned down the closest street into the city.


	4. Chapter 4

Christine trembled as the adrenaline finally subsided, and she turned her gaze from the retreating carriage to her drenched husband. He spoke sweetly with Gustave, calming the boy as best he could, with a firm and confident tone.

Gustave leaned into Raoul, shivering from the cold as he wrapped his arms around Raoul’s waist and buried his face in his father’s shirt.

Christine reached for her husband, desperate to feel that he was alive and fine. He seemed startled by her touch, but she was not deterred. She whispered his name, cupped the back of his head and pulled him close.

She kissed him with passion, with hunger and relief. For a few seconds, he did not respond to her embrace, but his hesitation was only momentary. She moaned when his hand cupped her cheek, and his tongue tasted her mouth.

How long had it been since they had kissed with such need and such fire? Did they ever? Breaking the kiss, she exhaled a shaky sigh and ducked her head against his chin.

He pressed a warm kiss to her brow. “I’m here, Lotte,” he said, calmly, but he suddenly waivered, staggering.

She wrapped an arm around his waist, holding him against her. “Come, my Dear, you must be frozen.”

Gustave wrapped an arm around Raoul as well. “I have you, Father. You can lean on me if you need to.”

With a small smile, Raoul rested his arm around Gustave’s shoulder as they walked down the boardwalk. “Thank you, Gustave. You have been very brave today.” He shuddered from the cold, and his teeth chattered.

Christine watched her husband and son. Gustave clung to Raoul, determined to help his father. His father. That was exactly what Raoul was, and after everything that had transpired that day, Raoul still dove off a pier to rescue Gustave. And then returned to the churning waters again to rescue the woman responsible for the child’s endangerment.

Erik had threatened harm upon her son, leveraging his safety so that Christine would sing a song. Would Erik have charged into the sea to save Gustave if he thought the boy was Raoul’s?

Resolute, she turned them off the boardwalk and up the nearest street. Where she would go, she was not sure, but she knew that she had no intention of staying at their provided lodgings.

“Christine?”

She looked up at her husband at the question, and she pressed her lips firmly together. With a quick shake of the head, she said, “We need to find a hotel. I will send for the luggage. We will find a place, but I’m not going back there. Gustave, stay close.”

Raoul did not comment or question, though his shudders worsened the longer they were outside. She guided them towards the first establishment she saw — a quaint, three-story brick building with an elaborate sign at the front. The name was an English phrase she did not understand, but she knew the word ‘Hotel’. Once inside, Raoul negotiated their boarding for the night. Christine wished her English were better to take the burden off of him.

When Raoul turned back to her, Christine slipped her arm around him again and followed the porter. She was relieved when Raoul gripped the railing to help pull himself up the stairs. “Someone is going for the luggage now,” he said. “If we need to return tomorrow because something was missed, so be it.”

She nodded and when the porter opened the door to their room, Gustave bounded inside. The porter gestured to a door at the far end of the room. “The small cot is through the door there. The water closet is at the end of the hall. Will there be anything else?”

“No, thank you,” Raoul answered, and waited for the porter to leave. He pointed to Gustave. “You have to strip out of that, or you’ll catch cold. There is no warm bath here tonight, but you can get into your bed and warm up that way.”

“But I’m not tired …” he protested, but at Raoul’s stern glance, he ducked his head. “Yes, Father.”

Christine reached for Gustave’s hand. “Here come with me. I will help you and tuck you in.” She led him through the door and into the closet that had been converted into a child’s bedroom by merely adding a cot. “He is right, you know. If you stay in these wet clothes, you could become sick.”

“I don’t want to be sick,” he said, and helped her take off his jacket. They worked quietly together, stripping the wet clothes away. “Will Miss Giry be alright?”

“I don’t know, Darling,” Christine responded. “I hope so. She is going to the hospital. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“I was exploring backstage,” he said, simply. “And then Miss Giry said that she wanted to show me something. And we walked and walked. I tried to pull away, but she didn’t let me. We got to the pier and … and she said we needed to swim.”

He trembled, and Christine hushed him, running her hands over his arms as she stripped him of the final layer of his clothes. Tugging on the blankets of the cot, she motioned for him to crawl in.

“But I don’t have any clothes.”

“I know,” she said, urging him again. “I will bring them in for you when our luggage arrives. So … she said you needed to swim?”

Gustave nodded, climbing into the cot, and he turned on his side to face his mother as she pulled the blankets over him. “Yes. And then Father was there. He was so brave, talking to Miss Giry and trying to help her. And help me. And it all just happened so fast. I was so frightened and then … then I was … I was in the water.”

“Hush, my Love,” Christine cooed, wiping the tears from his eyes. “No more, no more. I’m sorry I asked. I should not have asked that. I’m sorry.” She kissed his cheek and his brow.

“I want to be brave like Father,” he said, softly. “Do you think that one day I can be brave like him?”

With a soft smile, she brushed her fingers through his hair. “I think you are already very brave.”

“Not like Father,” he interrupted her. “I was afraid. I was afraid of Miss Giry and afraid of the water and … I don’t know how to swim. I wasn’t brave.”

“Of course you were,” she said, firmly. “Being brave means that even when you are afraid, you face those fears and do what you have to do. You were afraid of the water, and afraid of everything that was happening. But still you swam back to shore with your Father, didn’t you, and helped him with Miss Giry?”

Gustave snuggled into the blankets, pulling them up under his chin. “I did. She was so upset. She said that she sold herself for Mr. Y to get money and patrons for Phantasma, but she was so upset about it. If she didn’t want to sing for money, then why didn’t she just stop and do something else?”

“She said that?” Christine asked, firmly.

“Yes,” Gustave replied. “You’re angry. Please, don’t be angry with Miss Giry. She was so upset. I don’t think that she was thinking correctly. I was scared, but I’m okay.” To soothe her, he reached out to touch her cheek with a cold hand. 

She calmed at that and smiled for him, turning her head to kiss his palm. “Yes, you are.” Leaning down, she kissed his forehead again. “Try to rest and stay warm. I want to check on your Father, and I’ll be back with your linens once our luggage arrives.”

Gathering Gustave’s wet clothes, she exited the small converted closet and eased the door closed, leaving a small crack so she could hear him should she need. 

Raoul stood near the window and looked out at the darkened city. Hanging over the nearby radiator were his soaked shirt, pants, and socks, and he wore only his wet drawers and undershirt. Water puddled at his feet. He seemed lost in thought, his gaze blank, and she wondered how long he’d been standing there simply staring.

She hung Gustave’s clothes near the radiator as well, but her husband did not react to the movement. “Raoul?”

Jarred from his thoughts, he looked in her direction with a furrowed brow. He shivered and exhaled. “Ah, forgive me. I didn’t hear you come back in.” Ducking his head, he worked at the buttons of his undershirt and walked towards the radiator for warmth. “Is he alright?” He struggled with the buttons.

“Yes,” she answered, softly, and crossed the distance to him. Boldly, she reached for his shirt to help him. “Thanks to you.”

His hands stilled at her touch, and he didn’t seem to know what to do or say. He pressed his lips together, clenching his teeth, but that did little to mute their chattering.

“You look confused,” she said as she nimbly worked the buttons of his undershirt. His hands were cold to her touch. 

“Christine,” he sighed, and he touched her. His cool hand slid to her waist, his thumb daring to brush against her ribs.

She could not feel the chill of his hand through the layers of her dress, though she did feel the trembling. Whether through nerves or emotion, she was not sure. “Yes, Raoul.”

Tracing one hand upward on a slow journey of rediscovery, his fingers finally brushed the intricate sapphire jewelry still draped around her neck.

She reached back, unfastening the clasp of the necklace. With her eyes locked on his, she pulled the elegant necklace away, and without even a glance to the ornate piece, she dropped it to the floor. The jewelry clattered at the impact, and Christine returned her attention to his undershirt, unbuttoning it to the waist. 

She paused in her task, her tongue peaking out to moisten her lower lip, and she dared to splay her palm against the exposed flesh of his chest.

He said her name again, and when she looked up to meet his eyes, he licked his lips. His gaze drifted lower to her mouth, and he seemed to wait for a consent that was already given. When her fingers curled against his chest and her lips parted with anticipation, he kissed her.

She leaned in to his sweetness, and her hands moved from his chest down to his abdomen. He tasted of the ocean.

“You’re cold,” he whispered.

She smirked, playfully. “Says the man whose lips tremble.” And she kissed him again, as if that simple act could warm him. “Here, stay near the radiator.” Pressing closer to him, she laid her head on his shoulder and hugged him, uncaring that it dampened her dress.

Winding his arms around her, he rested his head against hers, and his hands absently rubbed her back. “They tremble from more than the cold. Ah, Christine, I think we have kissed more today than we have in the last year.”

Her arms tightened. “Perhaps two. We’ve been hurting these last few years, haven’t we. Me in my somber and distance.”

“Mmm, and me with my drink,” he admitted. “I didn’t like it when you grew distant.”

“And I didn’t like it when you were drunk.”

She felt him nod at that, and his hand rubbed at the small of her back. “I don’t like myself when I’m drunk either.”

“So what happens now?”

“I don’t know,” he chuckled. “I suppose in the immediate term, we wait for our luggage.”

For a few moments and for the first time in years, they stood in a comfortable silence. Christine closed her eyes, savoring the calm. It was something she had first loved about him all those years ago. “You used to hold me like this so often. It brought me such comfort then. And now.”

“If you want me here, Lotte, I’m here.”

“I think it’s quite obvious that I do,” Christine said, easing back to look up at him. “I sang the piece and took his money. When I couldn’t find Gustave, I was furious with you. You told me you were going to do this one thing, and here I was ready to go home with you to France. And you couldn’t even find our son and bring him to my dressing room. But that soon changed as I was directed on a frantic chase to find him and Meg. I neared the pier just in time to see Meg toss him over the edge and then fall in herself. You didn’t even hesitate to dive in after him.”

“Of course I dove in,” he responded with a narrowed brow. “Why wouldn’t I? I know what you and he … have said about him. I don’t care what you say about that. He’s my son. I raised him, even if I did a horrible job of it, nonetheless, he’s mine. Of course I dove after him.”

“Oh Raoul,” she cupped his face. “He is yours. I know what has been said, but I honestly do not know. The truth is that … yes, Raoul, when we were betrothed, I was untrue to you.” When he moved to step away, she slid her hands down to grab his biceps, keeping him in place. “Please, listen to me. I have no explanation. When I went to him that night, my intent was not to betray you. My intent was …”

Trailing off, she worried her lip before ducking her head. “I don’t know what my intent was, but it was not to lay with him. That just … happened. And I know what that sounds like. I do. I just wish I had another explanation for you. I don’t.”

He did not reply for a very long minute. When she gathered the courage to look up, he was watching her. He asked, “Do you regret it?”

It was the question she feared the most, knowing the answer that she would give and knowing his likely reaction. Refusing to avert her eyes, she replied, “I do not.”

He looked away from her and out the window again. His expression closed and his jaw tensed. There was no response, no raging anger or tearful disappointment. He offered only chilled distance. For some time, there was only tense silence between them, and Christine was at a loss for what more to say.

There was a knock on the door, and Raoul called out a reply in English. The door opened and the porter stepped in carrying two pieces of their luggage with a young boy behind him with the rest. She listened as Raoul and the porter exchanged a few more short words in English before the porter excused himself and closed the door behind him.

Christine stepped away from her husband to dig through her luggage in search of something for Gustave. Once she picked up the clean cotton drawers and undershirt, she closed the luggage. When she stood, she bumped into a firm body and startled.

From behind her, Raoul grabbed her arm to steady her then took Gustave’s undergarments from her hand. His gaze narrowed on her, and he said deeply and softly. “I never strayed. Ten years, Christine, the thought never crossed my mind. Not even these last years when I had craved you more than air. Never.”

He stalked to the closet door towards Gustave, and when Christine scurried after him, he glared back at her as if in warning. She stopped, worrying her lip again. Raoul said nothing more to her and pushed through the door, closing it behind him.

She rushed towards it, uncertain what to hope or expect, but she heard their voices clearly.

“Papa?” 

“Your things are here,” Raoul said. “Here, put them on.”

“Where’s …” Gustave trailed off.

“Where’s what?”

“Nothing,” Gustave said and there was silence for a long moment accompanied by ruffling clothing. “Papa, was it true? What Miss Giry said about me?”

“Gustave …”

“Please,” Gustave begged. “I’m not a baby. I want to know the truth.”

Raoul sighed. “Life is always so complicated, Gustave. Always more so than you hope it will be. Very often, we think we want truth, but truth doesn’t always bring us what we think it will. And sometimes it feels as if living in ignorance is better. Do you understand?”

“No,” Gustave said and paused, obviously waiting for an explanation that didn’t come. Cloth scuffled and rumpled. “Thank you, Papa, even if that didn’t really answer my question.”

“For what then?” Raoul asked, and Christine could hear the smile in his voice.

“For saving my life. And saving Miss Giry too.”

“Ah. Well, of course I would try to save your life. You have deserved more from me these last years, Gustave. I’m sorry that I have not been what I should have.”

“That’s not true,” Gustave said. “You are who you are. What else should you be?”

“Hmmf,” Raoul chuckled. “Better than I have been, I suppose. Come, get into bed now. You still look cold.”

“I am.”

“I will keep the door open then so that the radiator will heat your room here too.”

“Father?”

“Yes.”

“Will you teach me to swim?”

A spring squeaked, and feet scuffed. “You want to learn to swim? I should have taught you sooner.”

“I want to be able to swim like you did. And learn what you did to save Miss Giry. She’ll be alright, won’t she?”

Raoul sighed. “Gustave, I … I don’t think that Miss Giry … no, Son. No, she won’t be alright.”

“She won’t? But I saw the bubbles. She …”

“The bubbles weren’t …” Raoul trailed off a moment, and during the silence, Christine leaned against the wall near the door, listening. Closing her eyes, she brought a hand to her mouth and cried for the woman who was once her closest friend.

“Papa, she’s dead, isn’t she.”

“I do not know for certain,” Raoul said. “But when we brought her to the carriage, she was not alive. I’m sorry, Gustave. I was trying to protect you and your Mother from that truth. That’s why I tried to send you away. You didn’t need to see that.”

“But I touched her.”

“And so did I,” Raoul said. “Madame Giry, her mother, was there. I was not going to be rough or disrespectful with Miss Giry while we moved her to the carriage. And I thought that if you helped me, then maybe you wouldn’t be afraid.”

“Is that why Mister Y didn’t want to go with the carriage? Because she was already dead?”

“You caught that, hmm? I cannot speak to what Mister Y was thinking. You’ll have to ask him sometime. I’m sorry I put you in this position, Gustave. I thought … I wasn’t really thinking, I suppose.”

There was silence a long moment before Gustave finally replied. “I’m glad I helped you with Miss Giry, Father. I don’t think she was well, and I don’t think she meant to hurt me. Even though she did.”

“I think you’re right about that.”

“And if I knew how to swim, you could have saved Miss Giry because I could have saved myself. It’s my fault that …”

“It is not,” Raoul said, fiercely. “It is not your fault. None of this is your fault. In fact, in regards to everything … none of it is your fault.”

“Are we going to go home now?”

“It’s up to your Mother where we go from here. Tuck in, try to get some sleep.”

“Goodnight, Father.”

“Goodnight, Gustave.”

Christine pushed away from the wall, fiddling with the buttons of her blouse. Her hands trembled, and she resisted the urge to weep. Overwhelmed by the events of the last 48 hours, she could not stop the tear from slipping from the corner of her eye. Both Meg and Erik had threatened the well-being of her son, and still, she found herself mourning the loss of both, even though neither deserved her pity or compassion. 

How could she be so broken as to care about two people who threatened to murder her son? And in the case of Erik, how could she still care for and even love the man who so actively tried to sabotage her marriage and her family? She and Raoul were perfectly capable of sabotaging their relationship without his interference.

And what truth did Gustave seek that Raoul dodged? What had Meg said to her son? Unless ...

Shrugging out of the blouse, she carefully laid the silken fabric in her suitcase and pushed that wayward thought away. As she set the heavy skirt beside the blouse, she caught a glimpse of her husband out of the corner of her eye. With his back to her, he finished undressing. Her eyes lingered on his form. He was slender, even more so than in their youth, and she worried that he was, in fact, seriously underweight. There was a reddened area on the left side of his back, but from what, she wasn’t sure. Had she truly been so ignorant to his plight as she dwelled solely on her own?

Raoul draped his undershirt and drawers over a wooden chair near the radiator to dry and picked up a clean pair he had fetched from the suitcase. Stabbing his feet through the knee-length legs, he pulled up the drawers.

“Raoul.”

He hummed, peering back over his shoulder at her as he adjusted the waistband.

“Forgive me,” she whispered.

“For what?”

“Everything.”

He paused a long moment, searching her eyes. “Only if you do the same for me.”

With a sad smile, she nodded, reaching for him.

He crossed the distance to her, taking her in his arms in a fierce hug. “We shall start anew, Lotte.”

She shook her head against his chest. “No, I don’t want to start anew. I want to remember everything. Your sins and mine. Because things must be different this time, Raoul. We must speak with each other, speak the truth no matter how painful. It was our silence that nearly doomed us.” Nervously, she continued. “And we both must make some changes.”

Christine felt him nod, and he tightened his hold around her. He sighed. “I know. How long has it been since we’ve shared a bed?”

She twisted slightly in his arms to peer at the double bed. “It’s the smallest bed for two I’ve ever seen. Your feet will hang off the end.”

He chuckled, and his hands trembled against her back. Pulling away from her, he walked towards the bed, curling his fingers into a fist, and then he flexed his hands. “I’ll be fine.”

“Raoul?”

“I said I’ll be fine,” he snapped. Growling his own frustration, he rubbed his face. “I’m sorry. It’s just … I really want a drink.” Sinking onto the bed, he ducked his head and sighed. “I’ve never made it past two days,” he admitted softly. “I’ve tried to stop before, and I don’t make it past two days.”

Snarling, he glared at his hands. “It hasn’t even been eight hours.”

Christine sat beside him. The bed creaked and the mattress sank under their joint weight. She took his clammy hand in hers and squeezed. “What happened on day two that you could not get past it?”

He was silent for a long moment, and she waited, patiently. Her fingers absently played with his, and he looked down, watching. “I had a seizure,” he finally said. When her hand tightened around his at the word, he ducked his head. “It was three years ago after Gustave’s birthday. I had totally forgotten it, and was a monster that whole week. You may have noticed that I was gone for a few days, though you were probably relieved with the peace.”

Shaking his head, he looked away and to the window. “I rented a room in the dankest, dingiest inn I could find. I didn’t want to be seen. I locked myself in the room with no intention of coming out. Just had food brought to me, though water was in short supply. Couldn’t wet my palate with beer, so I just had nothing. Which was worse. Anyway, on the second day, after vomiting blood and constant sweats, I had a seizure. I just remember losing control and then when it all stopped, I was on the floor. And it felt like my brain was bleeding from my eyes. I’d never known pain like that before.”

Scoffing at himself, he shook his head. “I drank as soon as I awoke. The pain slowly eased, and the shakes had stopped. No more seizures. Other times I had tried to stop, it was only headaches, anger, and insomnia. But seizures? I have not tried to stop since.”

Frustrated, he pushed to his feet and stormed across the room to the window. Resting his forearm against the window frame, he peered out onto the darkened streets.

Christine watched him, worried. His hand trembled again, and he clenched a fist, holding it stiffly at his side as if that could stop the shaking. Sweat slickened his brow and body even though the room was quite drafty and chilled. His shoulders slumped forward under the weight of sorrow and the strains of his struggles.

Drawn by his pain, she padded across the room to him. When she placed a soft hand on the red mark on his back, he jumped. “What happened here?” she asked.

“The piling,” he answered. “The sea was rough. I’m fine.”

Gently, she turned him to face her. A rancid and sour odor clung to him, as if his pores oozed the alcohol that had pulsed through his veins over the last decade. She did not notice it even an hour ago when the scent of the sea had lingered. 

Words failed her, as they often did over the last few years with Raoul. What was once an exercise performed with ease and confidence in their youth was now awkward and uncertain. Though perhaps words were not enough to express her intent.

She cupped the back of his head and pulled him down. She kissed him, softly and sweetly, and in that simple kiss, she infused the affections she always held for this man. From their innocent and playful childhood, their sweet and supportive courtship, and even their turbulent marriage, Christine held all those memories close throughout the embrace.

His lips pursed to hers, and when she finally eased back, he tasted the sensation of her mouth on his with the tip of his tongue. “It can’t be this easy,” he whispered.

“What is that?” she asked, stroking the sweat-slicked hair back from his eyes.

“To fall in love with you all over again.”

She arched a brow and teased. “So you are saying that you fell out of love with me.”

He grinned. “I’m saying that I am so much of a drunk and a fool that I had forgotten, and then so easily you remind me what it is about you that drew me.”

“Oh? And what is that?” She probed. “Will you tell me? Is the romantic man still here? The one who wooed me with grand promises and pledges.”

“He is,” Raoul answered. “But I’m afraid that I will pale to what I had once said. The whiskey has turned my mind to mush, and I’m far more jaded and full of self-pity to utter such wishful poetry.”

“Try. Please, try.”

“As you wish,” he said. His brow furrowed in thought, and his tongue again touched the corner of his upper lip where she had kissed him only moments ago. “I have missed your taste these last many years, starved for it. Now that I know it again, I crave it though I am undeserving of your love and affection. As I drowned in liquor, I became a shell of flesh with veins full of drink and memories hazed by drunkenness. I failed you and our family. And with each failure, I descended further into self-hatred, when all I needed to do was reach for you.”

“A lifeline,” he said, sadly. “It would have been unfair to ask you to drag me from my hell, but you would have done it. Just like I wish you would have reached for me in your sorrow before all of this began. Perhaps things would have been different then, if we cleaved to each other instead of floundered alone.”

“No, no,” Raoul soothed, reaching up to wipe the stray tear that slipped from Christine’s eye. “No tears.”

She held his hand to her cheek. “I weep for what we have lost, what could have been. Do not elevate me to such an untouchable height, for I am deeply flawed in many ways. That I strayed when I did, that I kept it from you these long years. That I cannot bring myself to regret it. What does that make me, Raoul? What kind of horrible and wicked woman can betray the man she intended to love and honor with such carelessness. And then not even regret it.”

“No,” she shook her head, stopping him from interjecting. “I am not finished. All of this is my own doing. Your drinking did not begin until after Gustave was born. It was my distance and sorrow and secrecy that drove you away. And now, look how you suffer for it. Because of me.”

“That’s not true,” he vehemently denied. “Yes, that was one reason why I chose to drink, but that was my choice. I turned to drink to soothe my wounded pride and my failings. No one forced that first glass into my hand. No one forced me to wager our savings on a ridiculous game of cards. I did that. I made that choice, and I will not let you take that burden from me.”

Holding his gaze, Christine said, intently. “And it is not yours to bear alone. The burden is mine too. And perhaps together, the weight will not feel so crushing.”

He smiled at that, trailing a finger from her jaw and down around the collar of her corset cover. “You say you should not be on a pedestal, but it is you, my Dear, who speaks with wisdom in these moments. Is that not reason enough to elevate you to such levels?”

“If this is what passes for wisdom in your mind,” she teased, “you are not as bright and observant as I remember. I must have been mistaken then. Ah, I was so naive.”

His grin broadened, and he replied, “Oh, I had forgotten how sharp your tongue could be, wife. I am relieved that my carelessness, negligence, and vitriol hasn’t silenced it permanently.”

“I may have censored my words,” she admitted. “After all, when I tried to argue with or debate you, even converse with you in your drunkenness, it was never worth the outcome. But my thoughts still remained. And I may have enjoyed the thoughts even if I was unwilling to utter them to you.”

“Ah, Christine,” he sighed. “I wish now you would have. It may have awoken me from my idiocy.”

“I doubt that,” she answered. “Though I wish what you say were true. And why do you keep staring at my mouth as if you are guarded to what I will say? I have no intention of antagonizing you now.”

“That’s not why I stare,” he rumbled.

Instead of asking for clarification, Christine watched him. Unwavering in his focus, he fixated on her mouth, and when her lips parted, his gaze darkened. She whispered, “Raoul, I don’t think you’ve ever looked at me with such hunger.”

“Then you haven’t been looking,” he said, simply. His hand trembled, and he glared at the offending limb, clenching a fist until it finally stilled. Defeated, he looked out the window again, and rubbed his head. It obviously ached.

And Christine hugged him tightly, for she did not know what else to do or say.


	5. Chapter 5

Sunlight pierced through the window shortly after dawn, and Christine stirred in her bed at the slash of brightness across her face. Rousing, she reached beside her for her bedmate, but found the space empty and cool. Forcing her eyes open, she turned her head towards where Raoul had fallen asleep the night before.

He was gone.

She suppressed the surge of anger that rose in her — an accusation that he had returned to the comfort of whiskey. It was not so unreasonable that she assumed he returned to drink even after their heartfelt talk the previous evening. It was his routine these last years, after all.

Movement drew her attention, and she turned her gaze towards the motion. Gustave sat at the windowsill, wearing only the drawers he had slept in the night before. He peered out the window at the streets of New York City, his brow furrowed. After a moment, he looked down at a piece of paper in his hand, and appeared to read.

“Gustave?” Christine called, softly.

He startled and whisked the paper away from her view, tucking it between his leg and the window glass. “Mother. I didn’t see you wake up. How did you sleep?”

“Fine,” she replied, sitting up, and she raked a hand through her tangled mass of curls. “How long have you been awake?”

“A while,” he said. 

“Have you seen your father?”

“No,” he answered, though his eyes darted to the small table at the center of the room. “But that letter was on the floor by the door.”

Flinging away the blankets, Christine slipped out of the bed and padded to the table to pick up the letter. Her name was scrawled across the center in a familiar angular script. She frowned at the loosened flap of the envelope. “Gustave, did you open this?”

“Yes.”

“It is clearly addressed to me.”

“I know,” he said, sheepishly. “That is Father’s handwriting, and I was afraid something was wrong.”

“Then you should have woken me,” Christine stated, “And not read my correspondence.” Opening the letter, she read:

_My Dearest Christine,_

_I fear that I must tell you that I have failed you, yet again. Upon staring into the abyss, I faltered. I had hoped that lying in your arms would stem the rising tide of addiction, the gnawing cravings that ravage my body, but it was not enough. The rage, the ache, and the pain raced towards me, and I was powerless against it._

_To spare you my humiliating struggle and weakness, I must go. I am ashamed to admit that I cannot fight this alone. So I have gone to the only place that I can think of to help me conquer this vice, though I am sure that there will be judgement and damnation upon their lips at my sins. I have sought the nearest Church, and sure enough, they did not turn me away when I pleaded for sanctuary._

_What a sight it must have been. The Vicomte de Chagny on his knees and battered by his own foolishness. Perhaps my sisters were right all along. I am an embarrassment to the family and to you. Gambled away our comforts, drank away my responsibilities. For all of these things, I am sorry. You deserve better and so much more._

_I have been told that I will only get worse as the days pass, and yes, even worse than seizures. There is a real possibility that I will not survive. With this note, I have included a letter for Gustave. I ask that you give it to him should my trials prove fatal._

_For you, my Beloved Wife, I fear that I have nothing more than words. And though words, at this point, are meaningless, perhaps the truth is not._

_I realize only now that despite the many years that we have known each other and the many years we have been married, I never wrote you a letter. What kind of man does not write the woman he is wooing a love letter? What kind of man does not think to pen a declaration of some sort to his wife when their relationship strains? To try and reaffirm his devotion despite the turbulence._

_I should have, and so I shall._

_I fell in love with you when I was fourteen, and I was crestfallen when we parted. You were my first love, and, now I can say without hesitation, my only. No other woman could ever compare, not in my fantasies and not in reality. It has always been only you for me and no other._

_When I was in the navy, the days and nights at sea were long, and often the sailors would talk about what they had left behind, and what waited for them upon their return. Family, children, a woman’s arms, a promising employment opportunity. Yet, I had none of these things waiting for me. I even doubted that my family cared if I returned or not._

_And so I conjured a fantasy for myself that I never shared with anyone. I thought back to the only time I ever felt belonging, comfort, and love. And it was that summer with you. Yes, we were children, and there was innocence in our friendship and budding romance — if one could call it that — but it was love, at least for me._

_I remembered how we would jest and laugh, telling fantastical stories to each other and merge myth and legend into our own unique stories. I remembered how we first kissed on the beach, nervous and trembling with uncertainty, and how by the end of the summer there was comfort and even confidence in the kisses we shared. I had grown addicted to your taste even then, and I had thought that perhaps you felt the same of me. I let myself believe that you did._

_I also remember how we would sit under the trees with my head in your lap and you would rake your fingers through my hair as I poured out my soul to you. And that you never judged me, laughed, or mocked me for my words. You were so different from everyone else in my life._

_I remembered you so fondly, Christine, that I made you the foundation of this fantasy woman that waited for me back home. She looked like you, well at least what my eighteen-year-old mind thought you would look like. Everything about her was based on you. And it was her arms that I dreamt of. Her body that would welcome me home. She was you. That dream kept me warm for so many nights._

_And then we reunited, and my fantasy had paled to reality. I was captivated by you. Your beauty, your voice, everything about you. When we reunited in your dressing room, and I discovered that you remembered me as fondly as I remembered you, I was finally found again. A mooring in a sea of uncertainty. Even now all these years later, you are that mooring, but I in my cowardice have been too stubborn to reach for you even as I floundered rudderless._

_Long ago, I promised to be your shelter and light. To guide you from sorrow, darkness, and loneliness, and in my attempts to do just that, I wandered into darkness myself. Perhaps when I crawl from this hell, if I can find my way to your light and not that of the beyond, you will let me try again._

_Forever yours,_

_Raoul_

Christine wept and read the letter a second time, reverently touching the script where his hand had obviously shaken while he wrote. Folding it carefully, she tucked it back into the envelope and held it to her breast. “Gustave, was there a letter in here with your name on it?”

“Yes.”

“Where is it?”

“It’s mine,” he declared.

Christine glanced at her son, noting his tense body language. He fiddled with something at his side next to the window and out of her line of sight. She said, sternly, “As was this letter mine. Yet you opened it. Did you read it?”

“Yes.”

“Then I should read yours.”

“No,” he snapped, snatching his letter from his side and he held it protectively against his chest.

Observing her son carefully, Christine replied, “Then how do you think it feels that you have read mine. If you had read mine, then you are aware that letter was not meant for you at this time, even though it is addressed to you.”

“I don’t care,” he replied.

Sighing, Christine walked towards her luggage and tucked the precious letter away. “Would you like to tell me what is wrong? You’re very angry this morning.” She waited for a reply, but none ever came. Glancing back over her shoulder, she called to him. “Gustave?”

He pressed his lips into a firm line and focused intently on the letter in his hand. When he finally answered her, his voice was low and laced with anger. “Is Raoul de Chagny my father?”

“Why would you ask me that?” she asked, masking any honest reaction to the unexpected question.

“Because of what Miss Giry said,” he replied and turned narrowed eyes on her. “And Father … he … the Vicomte did not deny it.”

Gathering her thoughts and cornered by a question she was not entirely prepared to answer, she sat on the bed and clasped her hands in her lap.

“You’re hesitating,” Gustave noted, looking away from her and back at the letter. “So he is not.”

Resigned, Christine watched her son, pained by both the past and the unknown of the future. “The truth is … the truth is that I don’t know.”

“How do you not know?”

“Because I was young,” she responded simply. “And I made choices that brought me here to this very question. You’re too young right now to …”

“I am not,” he snapped and stood, his chin jutting out in defiance. “I am old enough to know the truth.”

“You are,” Christine answered. “But not to explain the how or the why.”

“I heard you last night,” Gustave said softly. “Everything that you talked about.” And he flushed at her shocked expression. “The walls are … I wasn’t trying to. But I did.”

“Ah, I see,” Christine said with a nod.

“You said you betrayed Fa … him. The Vicomte. But I don’t understand how that can just happen. You did it but you didn’t mean to do it? But you’re not sorry you did?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “And as for ‘how does that happen?’ Well, sometimes we are in situations that happen so quickly, and we get caught up in the moment. Sometimes we do things that we would not have done when not so excited or scared or confused.”

Gustave thought on that seriously, his brow furrowed in concentration, and he sat on the windowsill again, facing his mother. “Yes. Like when I’m playing and get too excited and I get too loud, then Papa … the Vicomte … he yells.”

Christine stood, crossing to her son, and she reached for his shoulders, relieved that he did not shrug her away. Tears gathered at the corner of his eyes. “Mother, I don’t want another Father. I want to be Gustave de Chagny.”

“And you are,” she said, fiercely. “While I carried you, it was Raoul de Chagny who refused to leave my side when I was ill, holding back my hair in my sickness. It was Raoul de Chagny who came to my bedside after I gave birth to you, beaming with pride. And it was Raoul de Chagny that leapt into the swirling darkened sea last night to pull you ashore.”

“And returned for Miss Giry,” Gustave said.

“Yes,” Christine said. “The Raoul de Chagny that I knew, the man that I married is very different from the man you have known. I pray that if what he says is true and he intends to give up drink, that he is still the man I remember. And then you can know him too.”

Wiping his nose with the back of his hand, he sniffed. 

Sighing, she stroked a hand through his hair. “I’m so sorry, Gustave. This never should have happened. I should never have brought us to New York.”

He shook her hand away and glared up at her. “So then you could keep lying to me about who my father could be? You said that you were untrue. Well, you wanted to be untrue to me too.”

“I was lying to you and to your Father,” Christine admitted. “Being untrue to someone, the way I said it to your Father is worse than lying. It is something that only people who are promised to each other can do. What I did … Gustave, when you find someone that you love and that you want to spend your life with and have promised to be with, you should never be untrue to them. No matter what you may feel or think. What I did was wrong.”

“Then why did you do it?”

“Gustave, I don’t know,” she answered, exasperated. “I’ve been trying to figure that out ever since it happened.”

“But you don’t regret being wrong?” he asked, clearly confused. “If I should never do it, but then you did and don’t regret it …”

“I’m not a good person,” she snapped, and sighed, ducking her head to rub her brow. “Gustave, I am not proud of what I did, what it meant, how it happened, and how I felt … how I feel. But it happened, and I did what I did, and now I must live with the consequences. We always must live with the consequences of our actions, no matter how painful the outcome. Those consequences in our world could be catastrophic for me … for us.”

“I don’t think you’re a bad person,” Gustave said. “The other man who might be my Father. It’s Mister Y, isn’t it.”

“Yes.”

“If I ask Mr. Y, will he know the truth?”

Christine shook her head. “I’m sorry, it doesn’t work like that. I am afraid that all I can do is speculate.”

She hesitated again for a long moment before she finally spoke again. “What I know is that you are my son. And whether it is Mr Y’s or Raoul de Chagny’s blood that also flows through your veins, it does not matter. It doesn’t change your mind or your heart. It does not change who you are or what you are capable of.”

Gustave reflected on her words, and Christine wondered how long it would take before he said anything at all. He looked down at the letter in his hands, and he read it. Only after he was done, did he respond. “Can we go find Father? I want to help him win his battle so that he can come home to us.”

Christine smiled, and her tears fell. She smoothed down her son’s hair and took his hand with hers. “Of course we can. First, we need to wash and then break our fast. I want you to look through your luggage and make sure you have everything. We may have to return to Phantasma to fetch anything left behind.”

Holding his mother’s eyes, he shook his head. “I don’t want to go back there.”

“We may have to,” she said. 

“No,” he rejected the idea and pushed off the windowsill, shoving his letter back into its envelope. “No, you don’t have to go back there. If something was left there, we don’t need it.”

“That’s not true,” she said. “And I understand that you don’t want to come with me, but … there is nowhere else you can stay.”

“I can stay here,” he stated. “I won’t get into trouble.”

“You’re too young.”

“I am not,” he snapped and stormed away from her and back into the small closet where he had slept. He slammed the door behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: In upcoming chapters, there will be mature themes that deal with alcoholism and alcohol withdrawal that may be triggering for some individuals. Beginning with Chapter 6, the rating will also be changed to E due to the nature of alcohol withdrawal as well as sexual situations later in the work.


	6. Chapter 6

Christine entered an inconspicuous brick building in the heart of Brooklyn and looked upon an expansive foyer. 

“Mother, look,” Gustave called and pointed to the left where an old foxhound with grey in his muzzle dozed on the floor in the sunlight of a distant window.

“I see,” Christine said. “I think he’s having a nap.”

“Hello and welcome,” a kind-faced young nun greeted in English as she approached them.

As she spoke, and gestured to the dog, Gustave looked on, clueless to her words. Christine smiled politely, and responded in broken English, shaking her head. “I am sorry. We … uhm … no English.”

“Oh!” The nun exclaimed and then held up a single finger as if indicating for them to wait. She scurried away and a few minutes later, an older nun approached them. 

“Hello and welcome to our clinic,” the nun greeted in  Québécois French and with a firm nod and focused tone. “I am Sister Marie-Agnes. How can I help you today?”

“Good Morning, Sister,” Christine replied. “I am Christine de Chagny, and this is my son Gustave. Is this the clinic associated with St. Bartholomew’s Parish?”

“It is.”

Relieved, Christine nodded. “Oh, good. Is my husband here? His name is Raoul de Chagny. I received a letter from him this morning, and I believe he may be here in your clinic. He would have arrived late during the night.”

“The name is not familiar,” the nun said. “Wait here, please.”

Gustave frowned as the nun walked away, and his fingers brushed his mother’s arm to draw her attention. “Why would she say that? I thought the priest said Father was here.”

“He did,” Christine said.

It was a long few minutes before the nun returned, and when she did, she carried an open book. As she skimmed one of the pages in the book, she asked. “What did you say your name was again?”

“Christine de Chagny,” she answered. “And my son is Gustave. My husband’s name is Raoul de Chagny. He is French with blond hair and green eyes. And a small scar on his jaw right here.” She touched the underside of her jaw on the right side. “It’s a little jagged.”

With her focus firmly on the paperwork in her hand, the nun asked, “What was your maiden name, Madame?”

“Daaé,” Christine said.

“I see,” the nun said. “We did not have a Raoul de Chagny come in last night, but a man matching that description using a different name — Henrik. You are listed here under your maiden name as his next of kin.”

“Henrik,” Christine repeated, and her brow furrowed in thought as a distant memory nagged at the back of her mind. Her confusion cleared, and she arched a brow. “Henrik von Henrikson?”

“Mother,” Gustave touched her hand. “Who is Henrik von Henrikson?”

Christine squeezed her son’s hand. “When your father and I were children, we created a fictitious viking warlord who was the hero, and sometimes villain in the stories we imagined. We named him Henrik von Henrikson.”

“That’s not very creative,” Gustave said.

Chuckling, Christine shook her head. “No, my Love, it was not. But we thought it was very funny.” Turning her attention back to the nun, she asked. “May we see my husband? Please, I don’t … we don’t want him to battle his addictions alone.”

“It is not something usually done,” the nun said. “The withdrawal from alcohol is a demonic affair, and not for the eyes of children.”

“I’m not a child,” Gustave declared with his chin held high.

Christine clasped her hand to her breast, pleading. “He is all the family I have in this world. Please, Sister.” 

Sister Marie-Agnes hesitated, her eyes narrowed in thought. “Wait here, please.”

Christine could do nothing more than wait. Minutes past, and soon, Gustave grew restless and turned his attention to the dog. The old hound greeted the affection with muted excitement, his tail thumping against the floor. A tongue peaked from his mouth a few times, and he huffed a heavy sigh.

Wandering through the foyer, Christine followed the familiar scent of frankincense. To her right she found a small chapel illuminated by gas-lit candles. Three rows of short pews faced a simple wooden altar, and a crucifix was affixed to the wall near a small ornate box that was likely the tabernacle. 

Drawn to the sacred space, she walked into the chapel, and crossed herself in respectful prayer. A calmness settled over her, a peace that often escaped her but that she often sought. A peace she only ever felt in places of reverence. 

In her youth, faith had brought her comfort especially after the loss of her father. A religious man, he instilled upon her a sense of devotion and servitude, and when left alone in the world after his death, she searched for the warmth and comfort her father had once fulfilled in the arms of the church. Through prayer, she had found relief. And then finally, she had found the angel.

He first came to her during prayer while she knelt at her father’s grave, pleading for guidance, for respite. His voice had brought her comfort and clarity in a world of cruel and suffocating strain. He had inspired her voice, touched her very soul, and drove away the pain of loneliness. Even all these years later, she had trouble accepting that the Angel of Music was the same man who murdered, threatened and conspired.

Slipping into the pew, she knelt, clasped her hands together and ducked her head. She prayed for her father’s soul, asking for guidance and help. Where had she faltered so much in her life? Why had she given in to temptation and sought the arms of another lover the night before her wedding? And why did she then have the nerve to stand before God and pledge her loyalty to Raoul after betraying him so?

She reflected on her life and her choices. She told God everything about her fears and inhibitions, her uncertainties and her torn loyalty between two far-from-perfect men. As if God would not know of her struggles. She yearned for some kind of assistance, some kind of guidance as to what she should do, and what would be best for Gustave. He was really all that mattered, not her own folly.

Movement beside her drew her attention and a priest stepped into the pew next to her and knelt. A young man with thick blond hair and dark eyes, he smiled at her and observed her with a soothing calmness. “Forgive me, I did not mean to startle you. May I pray with you? I think that sometimes prayer said together can have greater resonance, don’t you?”

Christine shifted to stand. She did not understand what the priest had said, though she knew it was English. She searched her mind for the few English words she knew. “I am sorry.” Backing from the pew, she pointed to the door. 

“You are French,” the priest said in stilted French. “You do not have to go.”

She stilled and smiled, hopeful that his French was better than her English. “No, it’s alright. I didn’t mean to intrude on your chapel.”

His brow furrowed, and he motioned to the pew beside him again. “My French is not so good. English, Polish, and Norwegian.”

Christine brightened at that and opted to speak Swedish. “Norweigian! I am originally from Sweden, though it has been a while since I’ve had to use it. I hope it’s not as rusty as it sounds to my own ears.”

He laughed at that and sat back on the pew, answering her in Norweigian. “It sounds beautiful. Almost close enough to my home. Come, sit with me, and tell me what brings a Swedish Parisian to our chapel?”

“There aren’t many Catholics in Norway,” Christine commented and sat in the pew.

“I am not Norwegian by birth,” the priest said. “I was born in Poland. My family immigrated to Norway when I was eight. Norway is more home to me than Poland. I do not remember much of the land of my birth. There are even fewer Catholics in Sweden than in Norway.”

“My father and I traveled much, and eventually we settled in France,” she said. “France is not, how shall I say this. France is not particularly welcoming to protestants, so my Father decided that we should convert to Catholicism. We were already foreigners in a strange land, so conversion made sense.”

“Ah, I see,” the priest said with an understanding nod. “So you were Lutheran.”

“Yes,” Christine replied.

“Then your conversion was risky,” the priest noted. “I had thought it was illegal for Swedish Lutherans to convert.”

“It was,” Christine said. “But by the time my father and I were in France, Catholicism was a recognized religion. Even if it was looked down upon.”

Flushing, she stumbled through a quick reply. “Not that … uhm, not that there is anything wrong with Catholicism. I was not …”

He chuckled, reaching out a calming hand to her. “There is no need to explain. I understand what you mean. So what brings you here to New York?”

“Work,” she answered. “I’m an opera singer.”

“I see,” the priest said. “And what brings you to our little chapel in our clinic?”

Christine turned her eyes from the priest to instead focus upon the altar. Resigned, she admitted. “My husband is here, though they will not let me see him. He came some time during the night, struggling with cravings for drink. I never would have thought to describe his addiction as demonic, or have used that word lightly to describe anything he may be suffering with now. But I suppose it is not wrong that he must battle these demons to return to me and our son. Tell me, Father, will whiskey leave its mark on him forever, or can he truly be rid of the vice?”

“Ah,” the priest nodded and gestured to her. “Demonic, hmm? You must have spoken with Sister Marie-Agnes.”

Christine nodded.

“You’re the wife of the Frenchman with the Swedish surname,” the priest continued.

“I am,” she answered. “He used an alias. I am not surprised. He admitted to me that he felt shame in this struggle, but he has nothing to be ashamed of. His name is Raoul de Chagny, despite what is written on your paperwork.”

“I see,” the priest replied and paused a moment in reflection. “Think of the battle with alcohol like the dark water in a well. Many people who drink can enjoy a glass of wine or even four, but then they can pull themselves out of the water, climbing free of the confines of the well walls as the water level is very near the surface and they never drink the water too low. But those who develop an addiction, like your husband has, the well is deeper and the water is lower because they have consumed so much. They cannot climb out alone, and so they bob in the water, consuming more and more of it until those of us at the surface can no longer even see those within the well. Without help, they will drown.”

“I won’t let him drown,” Christine stated. “Not alone. I will jump into that well with him, if need be.”

“Are you certain?” the priest asked. “The description of his battle as demonic was not an exaggeration. Witnessing the symptoms and consequences of alcohol withdrawal can be terrifying.”

“And so he must be terrified as well,” she concluded. “Father … forgive me, I don’t know your name. But please, can you take me to him. I need him to know that he is not alone.”

The priest regarded her quietly a long moment before responding. “Very often, those who seek our help do so with the understanding that their struggles will remain anonymous. We protect the privacy of those we help, and also strive to shield their loved ones from the pain of their struggle.”

“I understand,” Christine said through clenched teeth. “I am not afraid of his trials.”

“His suffering will get far worse before it gets better,” the priest warned. “These are not visions for the faint of heart. The memories will be lasting. I do not use these metaphors lightly, Madame de Chagny, are you prepared to stare a demon in the eye and not cower under his scorn?”

She smiled knowingly at that and held the priest’s focused gaze with one just as intent. “With all due respect, Father, but you do not know me. I assure you that I have the courage to face whatever the manifestation of my husband’s addiction shall be.”

Despite her assurances, the priest still hesitated, and it was in that moment that Christine understood the severity of her husband's situation and also the very real possibility that he may not survive it.


	7. Chapter 7

Raoul sat on the floor in the corner of the small private bedroom at the clinic. Sweat slickened his body, and he wore only a pair of linen drawers after having stripped away the rest of his clothing over the last few hours and tossed it aside. His forearms rested on his bent knees, and his chin was tucked to his chest as if his head were too heavy to hold up. His hands twitched, and he snarled at the involuntary movement.

A tingling sensation crawled over his skin. He had given up on trying to scratch it though his fingers still curled occasionally with the urge. Fire burned his tongue and scorched down his throat. Sleep had eluded him, and a piercing pain radiated from the back of his neck into his head to settle behind his eyes.

He had been blessed with a small reprieve not long ago and managed to finally pass out from exhaustion, but it did not last long. On the contrary, after waking up, he found that he was still in that same hell that he had left, only this time it felt like an oven.

His heart raced, pounding erratically, and Raoul pressed a hand to his chest, wincing at the tightness that never abated. He wanted to yell out, to scream and shout his frustrations, but it served no purpose, and when he last raged against God and cursed the hellspawn of the Phantom in search of a target for his anger, the movement brought on another wave of nauseousness that ended in only dry heaving and finally, the vomiting of blood.

He heard the door to his room open and recognized the familiar footfall of Sister Marie-Agnes. He didn’t bother looking up.

“Monsieur,” she called, sternly. “I have some fresh water for you and a chunk of crusty bread. You should try to force it. You must eat and drink or you will feel worse.”

“I’ll just start vomiting again,” he muttered.

“And you will die if you do not force the water and try the food.”

Sneering and grumbling, he glanced up as the nun approached him and handed him a metal plate with a hunk of crusty bread at the center. He took the plate, glaring at the chunk of bread.

“I assure you, it is not poison,” she said and placed the pitcher of water on the small table near the bed. Picking up the metal bucket at his side, she peered inside. “Not nearly as much as earlier. A new bucket is over by the door. Force the water.”

Raoul nodded, and the nun walked to the water pitcher, pouring a small amount into a mug. Handing the water to the Vicomte, she waited. When he still hesitated, she arched a single expectant brow.

Muttering under his breath, he sipped the water, and with a curt nod, Sister Marie-Agnes left the room.

Raoul hated to admit it, but the water felt good. His parched lips burned, and his tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth when it wasn’t twitching. Pouring more water into his mouth, he swished the cool liquid through his teeth. Setting the plate aside, he stood and walked to the door to spit the water into the bucket. 

Grabbing the bucket’s handle, he walked back to the corner he had just abandoned and set the bucket down. Pacing to the window, he peered out onto the peaceful courtyard at the back of the clinic. Exhausted, cranky, achey, and sweaty, he glared at nothing and everything.

Sunlight reflected off a window across the way, and Raoul winced, averting his eyes. Stalking away from the window, he picked up the plate and carried it to the bed. Sitting, he stared at the hunk of bread. He felt no hunger, but knew that it had been over a day since he last ate.

Tearing at the crusty chunk, he managed to eat half of it before setting the plate aside. Stretching out on the bed on his side, he closed his eyes against the nauseousness and exhaustion. Finally, he succumbed to fitful sleep.

+++

Churning in his gut roused him from sleep, and Raoul resisted the urge to gag, pressing his lips together to fight the nauseousness. He sat up, struggling as his head spun and the dizziness only amplified his queasiness. Moaning, he ducked his head into his hands and exhaled a slow breath between pursed lips.

Grasping blindly at the bed stand, he fumbled for the mug of water. Slowly, he drained the contents of the glass, hopeful that this time it might settle his rumbling stomach.

He was sorely mistaken.

His body heaved, desperate to rid itself of the recently ingested liquid, and Raoul scrambled across the floor towards the bucket and collapsed onto his hands and knees. He ducked his head as he retched, and the burn of acid scalded his throat as he vomited bitter bile, water and blood.

When the involuntary heaving stopped, he remained, his head hanging limply. He spit once and then again into the bucket, and he panted as he tried to recover. A string of saliva dangled from his lower lip, but he could not be bothered to wipe it away. 

His gut gurgled and protested like a great yawning maw, as if a beast resided inside him rumbling its discontent. His arms trembled and sweat dripped from his brow into his bucket. He retched again, unable to stop the surging nauseousness.

He heard the door to his room open but he didn’t care who it was, and he angrily wiped at the tears in his eyes. The door closed and then there was a rustling of fabric. The scent reached him first — flowers. Viciously, he shook his head, muttering and pleading that the visitor to his room was not who he thought it was. He vomited again — water and blood.

His visitor knelt beside him, and he did not even have the strength to look in their direction. His fears were confirmed, however, when soft and cool hands splayed on his back. Even after all the years of distance, he knew her touch.

“Raoul.”

He sobbed at the sound of her voice — his beloved Christine. Why had she come? Warm lips pressed to the skin of his shoulder, his back, his shoulder again. He spit into the bucket and shrugged away from her.

“No, Raoul,” she soothed and draped an arm around his waist to keep him in place. “I’m here.”

“I don’t want you here,” he rasped. “Not like this. You can’t see this.” Her scent invaded his lungs, and he realized then the sour odor that permeated the room and oozed from his skin. Ashamed, he jerked away from her touch.

She let him.

Crawling across the room, he retreated towards the bed, and he was relieved that she did not follow him. Crouched on the floor, he refused to look her way but he heard the clanking of metal and the door opened.

Curious, he looked. Christine stood near the open door, but he could not see what she did; her back was to him. 

Her hair was tied up off her shoulders and pinned into an intricate twist of curls on the back of her head. She wore a maroon dress that was quite familiar. It was the first dress he bought for her after they married, and she had had it altered many times over the last decade to adapt to the changing fashions. She had said that it was because the dress was her favorite color, but he wondered if it was perhaps due to necessity because of his failings as a provider. 

She stepped back into the room, a bucket in her hand and she closed the door, leaving them alone. Regarding him cautiously, she walked towards the corner where she had found him and set the bucket down.

He ducked his head away from her, cowering on the floor. “Why are you here?” His shoulders sank forward, and he sniffled, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. He did not have the courage to try and struggle to his feet, to waiver while she watched.

“Because my husband is battling the greatest adversary of his life,” she replied. “And I won’t let him do that alone.”

“I’ve battled my greatest adversary already,” he snarled. “And lost time and again.”

“Have you? And when was that?”

“You know when,” he snapped, and his eyes narrowed on her. “And who.”

“Is that so?” she asked and extended her hands out to her sides. “Yet here I stand. With you. Is that a loss in your eyes?”

He looked away, lacking a reply. When she let the silence linger, he struggled to his feet. Staggering a moment, he steadied himself.

How was it that after everything that had happened in the last day, Christine still appeared unphased by the recent turn of events? Her dress was tailored and clean, and her hair was perfectly coiffed even without the customary fashionable hat. She watched him with calmness and compassion, and he hated her for her composure when all he felt was rage, need, and confusion. His eyes lingered on her and his mind drifted to a time long past when she had let him touch her, hold her, even see her bared before his eyes.

The jealousy simmered for he was not the only one to have seen and tasted her flesh. He would never have faulted her for an act before they reaffirmed their once innocent love as something far more mature. After all, Raoul did not come to their relationship innocent of the flesh, but he had been loyal once he pledged his devotion. That she had strayed regardless of reasoning tore at him.

Why was it that despite her betrayal and the possibilities about Gustave’s paternity that his thoughts still turned lustful whenever he looked at her? Was she only another addiction?

Glancing downward, he sneered at his own impotence. Even when thinking such lustful thoughts about his wife, his body no longer responded. For years, his body often refused to respond. What kind of man was he?

Neutered and lacking, he turned away from her. He clenched his fists as he stalked to the other end of the room. He had asked for her forgiveness last night and had promised that they would move forward together, yet despite those wishful dreams, the past haunted him.

A black shadow fluttered at the corner of his vision, and he spun quickly to confront it, defensive. He saw nothing suspicious, though Christine watched him with obvious concerned. At his darting gaze, she glanced around as well.

His head pounded with a piercing pain, and tiny globes of light danced before his eyes, though he could not focus upon them. Christine took a hesitant step towards him, and he wondered what she saw that made her so alarmed. 

Darkness consumed him.

+++

When Raoul roused, he was laying on his side on the floor of his room with his head pillowed on a pile of blankets and with the corner of that blanket in his mouth. His entire body ached, and it felt as though he had been run over by a carriage drawn by draft horses. He tasted blood. Forcing his eyes opened, he tried to make sense of what had happened.

Sister Marie-Agnes knelt at his side near his hips, but what she was doing, he did not know. Christine stood by the door, her expression one of terror and worry; a young nun he did not recognize restrained his wife with a firm hold.

Christine pushed away from the nun and raced to him. She dropped to her knees near his head and leaned down to look at him, pulling the blanket from his mouth. Dazed, his eyes fluttered, and he struggled to stay awake. He sighed her name.

“I’m here,” she whispered, stroking his hair back from his face. That hand trailed down over his shoulder and arm before touching his cheek again. “I’m here.”

“It happened,” he mumbled. “Didn’t it? I … I’m so tired.”

“It did,” she answered. “Come, can you move? We need to get you to the bed.”

He nodded, his eyes half-closed. He shifted onto his stomach, but could not do much else. Two priests entered the room, and with the assistance of the two nuns, they lifted him into the bed. Helpless, he could only lay still as Christine coaxed him onto his side, and the young nun covered him with a cotton sheet.

He licked his parched lips, forcing his eyes to stay open to focus on his wife. “Don’t leave.”

“I won’t,” she promised, kneeling at his side. “Sleep. Shh, Raoul. I’m here.” Searching his glazed eyes, she leaned closer to him and whispered, “ _ Tu es l’amour de ma vie _ .” Her lips touched his, and she kissed him without trepidation or hesitation.

He succumbed to exhaustion surrounded by the warmth of her words and with the sensation of her lips upon his.


	8. Chapter 8

Christine waited in the dressing room that had been assigned to her at Phantasma. Only two days ago, she stood before the mirror by the vanity preparing for a performance, ignorant to the simmering discontent that threatened the stability of her life. How her life had changed so drastically in so short a time.

She entered the attached bedroom and searched one last time. Spotting one of Gustave’s stray socks, she picked it up from where it was hidden half-way under the bed. Leaving the bedroom, she tucked that sock into the small satchel she had brought with her. Extracting the sapphire necklace from the bag, she set it upon the table; it’s beauty no longer awed her.

She waited in the room, knowing he would come. She was not alone for even fifteen minutes before she felt him in the room, watching her. At one time, his presence brought her peace and comfort. In a world of loneliness and fear, he was a steady calm, always watching and always protecting. Was the term ‘protecting’ the right descriptor for his actions?

“Where have you been?” he demanded more than asked.

In her youth, such a tone had chilled the blood in her veins, and fearful, she had always submitted to whatever his demands were. Even when his demands were detrimental to her, she obeyed. On her first day in New York, she reverted to that terrified young girl the moment she saw him, as if the courage and strength honed over ten years had suddenly vanished.

After witnessing the terrifying consequences Raoul suffered for his drinking and realizing that she could lose him forever, Erik’s voice did not hold the same power that it did only days ago.

She regarded her one-time tutor, unable to hide the exhaustion from her features. “I’ve been with my family, Erik. Where do you think I have been?”

He seemed surprised by that answer at first, though that reaction was only momentary. Anger soon surfaced. “You have not been here. You were supposed to wait for my return.”

“That is what you commanded,” Christine said. “I, instead, saw to my husband and my son. Tell me, how is Meg?”

“You don’t need to worry yourself about that,” he replied. “After what she did …”

“She was my friend,” she interrupted him. “A long time ago, she was my closest friend. Is she dead?” When he was silent, she prompted him. “Erik?”

“Yes.”

She closed her eyes, turning away from him at the sharp and emotionless reply. Tears gathered in her eyes.

Erik sighed, flicking his hand in her direction as he approached the vanity. “Why do you insist on crying for those who do not deserve your pity?” Scowling, he picked up the sapphire jewelry and glared over his shoulder at her.

Shaking her head, she covered her mouth with her hand, biting back a retort. Ignorant to his reaction to the necklace, she asked, “When you first came to New York, how did you build Phantasma? Were Meg and Madame Giry with you?”

“They were.”

With dread, she pressed. “And did they help you build this business? Lure a clientele?”

“They did,” he answered. “None of that matters anymore. Where is Gustave?” 

“He did not come with me,” she said, and turned to face him. “You did not answer my question.”

“Where is he if he did not come with you?”

She sighed. “He is with his Father. We will likely be staying in New York for six to eight weeks, and I need work.” Focused, intent, she swallowed any pride or misgivings, any discomfort. “I’ll sing anything you want.”

Shocked by her statement, his eyes widened, and he stepped closer. “You wish to sing my music? But what will happen after six to eight weeks.”

“I don’t know,” she replied. “I simply cannot promise more than that.”

“Six to eight weeks,” he repeated, and sighed, reaching for her. “I have waited so long. You will sing for me again. Sing my music.”

“I will,” she said but did not take his outstretched hand.

“Come,” he coaxed. “I have so much to show you.”

Frozen in place, she watched as he walked to the door and waited for her. Curling his finger, he beckoned her. And just like that, all thought of Gustave had been dismissed. In the end, all Erik cared about was the music.

Reluctant but resigned, she followed him through the labyrinth of Phantasma’s tents, stages, and exhibitions. It was so similar to her first physical encounter with him all those years ago, only this time they did not traverse the rancid and darkened sewers beneath the opera house but instead they traveled in the warm sunlight of a September day.

He led her to a gnarled and darkened tower at the center of the amusement park, and from his pocket, he extracted a grotesquely shaped key. He radiated tension, and he said through a clenched jaw, “This has become my sanctuary these last years.”

She wondered what it was about his sanctuary that seemed to anger him as she followed him up a winding staircase. At the top, he opened the door into an expansive aerie. Windowed doors at opposite ends of the room led onto balconies that overlooked Phantasma.

The room was a spacious and open one-room apartment. One section had a bed and small dresser, another a washing table and tub, and another still had a massive organ with shelves of books and manuscripts. The automaton from his opera house lair was seated in a chair near the organ, and hanging on a wall near the pipes was a large portrait of her. Painted in oil, the portrait appeared to move upon the canvas while she wandered around the room as if it watched her.

She shivered, unable to escape the chilling realization of the depth of this man’s obsession. “Why have you brought me here?”

“I need to show you the music,” Erik replied, gesturing to the stacks of manuscripts near the organ. Climbing onto the elevated platform, he loomed over the instrument, his gaze focused on the composition on the music stand of the organ. 

“For so long, there was silence,” he explained and picked up a nearby pen. “Years passed and the music … it escaped me. Without you, there was only silence. And so I focused instead on designing this place. Phantasma.”

He gestured to the window. “Everything you see was by my design. The placement of every exhibit, every attraction. Even every chair is placed with purpose. And at the center of this venue, the stage. Where music shall thrive and audiences embrace music. All music, Christine. Music of quality, of course. But especially my music.”

“How did you ever fund this?”

He dismissed the question with a swift flick of the hand. “The money did not matter. This was about art. The Girys handled the capital end of things.” Placing his hands on the sides of the organ, he leaned over the instrument. “I managed the creative design. The construction, the perfection that would be this place.”

His fingers curled against the wooden organ, and his jaw tightened. “This sanctuary. Where a performer would not be judged by how they looked, but by the talent they possessed. That the freaks would not be laughed at, mocked and ridiculed but instead revered. We would not be forced to hide in darkness, but instead would walk in the light without fear.”

When Erik looked towards her, he quickly turned away, averting his gaze to instead look at the music again, and Christine wondered if he so easily saw compassion. He picked up the closest manuscript and with a tentative touch, brushed his fingers over the cover. “It was years before the music came back to me. But it did. It did, Christine. She didn’t abandon me like I feared she did. I had thought that when you left, you took her with you.”

Descending from the organ platform, he approached her. “But you didn’t. The music came back and I could write again. I wrote for everyone, any performer who wanted it. And I taught them. I taught them all, just like I taught you. They tried so hard, but in the end, they left me cold and disappointed. They paled to you, Christine, and I knew that I could never give them my most precious works. Those were reserved for you and you alone.”

When he held the manuscript out to her, she took it from his hands. Cradling the spine in her palm, she opened the cover to look at the music.

He watched her with unblinking eyes and pointed to the first measure. “We were meant for this, Christine. Your voice and my music merged as one. It is a perfect melding of my genius and your talent. I have groomed and molded you for this, to give you the knowledge and the training to sing the kind of music that I write. Music that is not for just anyone, but only for a voice like yours. A voice I know and that rings in my mind.”

Shifting, he stepped back from her. “And you will sing for me again.” Rushing back to the platform, he picked up the pen again. “I have so much more to compose. I can hear it. Can you? The music. You have said six to eight weeks, but I know that you will be unable to resist my music. You will wish nothing more than to stay in New York and sing what I compose.”

The wonder and hopeful nature faded and his gaze narrowed. He pointed at her with his pen. “I will pay any price. Name your salary. I know you need the money as your husband is absolutely worthless. Any price, Christine, and it is yours.”

Dismissing her response before she could even utter it, he placed his fingers over the keys of the organ. “I will play the first piece for you so you know precisely how it must sound, and you will perform it tomorrow. Every night, you will go on at eight o’clock.”

Christine turned from him to read through the manuscript as he performed the work. Atonal with an uneven rhythm, she easily followed along. He sang and the organ beneath accompanied a legado and traditional melody line with intense dissonance. The lyrics spoke of longing and loss. A story of lovers separated by time and unable to reunite.

The music called to her, as his compositions always did, and yet Christine felt an intense sadness that had nothing to do with the context of the song.

In that moment, standing in the aerie of Phantasma, she realized that any love she felt for this man was not reciprocated despite the lyrics of his song. Not in the way she needed love. There was no physical desire, or if there was it was nearly forgotten amidst the call of music. There was no partnership, no place for humor, comfort, or even kindness. Theirs was a transactional relationship, one honed in manipulation, obsession, and control.

Erik did not want to be or have a partner. He wanted a muse. He wanted a tool to assist in his creative outlet with no consideration that she may have her own interpretation to his music. He did not care for her creative needs. The beauty of music was that a performer could always bring their own vision to any piece performed, and yet Erik wanted to mute her artistic interpretation so she could be only an instrument that followed his precise instruction.

Glancing to the automaton, she wondered if she were really so different from that machine in his eyes. If the automaton could sing, would he even have a need or desire for her? Did he care for the human woman at all or only for the disembodied instrument that was her voice? And it was not even her voice, for he had no interest in her autonomy, her opinion or her creative interpretation as an artist, but only in the sound she could create through song. His specific demands for that song.

Turning her gaze back to the man who haunted her past and present, she felt an odd sense of relief. In her youth, she had thought that she could love him, to live with him and sing his music and be happy. She knew now that there would have been no happiness for her in that life. A life of servitude where she had no agency or worth in the eyes of her partner as anything more than a means to further his vision. She would have wasted away, longing for something deeper and meaningful, craving a physical intimacy that he may have offered but with a detached and partial interest. 

She would have longed for Raoul, and the life and love he had promised her all those years ago. She would have wondered and hoped. She would have lived with the nagging notion of regret.

Christine acknowledged that her husband was far from perfect, but she knew without doubt that he loved her as more than a commodity to be possessed. Her mind drifted back to the letter he had written her, and she thought of his battle against his addiction to alcohol. She remembered how he begged her to stay, to not abandon him after the seizure ravaged his body.

Raoul needed her. Not an instrument, muse or tool, but begged for her as a woman, as his wife. As a breathing, thinking, and feeling human and not a thing to be molded and used to his own end. He begged for her comfort, for her support and her love without any conditions or expectations. He wanted whatever she was willing to give, and for Christine, she wanted to give him everything.

When she gazed into her husband’s fear-stricken eyes after he awoke from fitful trembling, she had pledged to him that he was the love of her life. It was the truth. She had told him that she would never leave him in a promise both heartfelt and organic. 

As Christine again experienced the power of Erik’s music, it did not have the same effect on her as it once did in her youth. There was no more confusion or uncertainty about where she wanted to be in life or of where her future should go. She knew that her heart belonged to Raoul de Chagny, and she intended to follow her husband into the depths of his addiction, wherever that may lead them. 


	9. Chapter 9

Raoul awoke from fitful slumber. Pain twisted his stomach and his parched lips burned. He yearned for sleep, but the blessed relief had eluded him since he came to the clinic. Only after that terrifying seizure did he find true and peaceful sleep, succumbing to exhaustion and desperate to escape the raging pressure in his head.

He had thought he heard and felt Christine in those moments after the attack. He thought that he had felt her touch, her hushed voice in his ear as she soothed him. Heard a declaration so precious from her lips that he thought he would weep, and he had managed to fall asleep with a settled peace he had not known in years.

Stirring, his eyes fluttered open to take in the moon-lit room.

A cylindrical shadow stood over him, blocking the window from his view. Wide-eyed, Raoul stilled and blinked to try and clear his vision. The shadow remained, hovering as if watching him from its place standing at his bedside. Terror seized him. His heart raced, pounding against his breastbone. Sweat beaded on his brow and his breath quickened.

Like a great mound of darkness, the shadow stood tall, and the bulbous lump that would be its head twitched as if an electrical current coursed through its body.

Petrified, Raoul could do nothing more than watch as the shadow slowly retreated from view and faded into a darkened corner of the room.

There was stillness then, and he saw no more movement. His chest ached and a sharp pain pierced his chest. His breath came in shallow pants, and his limbs felt heavy. Desperate to escape and react, he willed his body to move. Rolling onto his side, he stumbled to his feet, spinning quickly to face the suspicious corner on the other side of the room.

His foot bumped into the nearby bucket, and he tripped. Catching himself against the wall, he spun to face the shadows. Step by step, he backed up into the opposite corner and startled when his back pressed against the stone. Leaning down, he fumbled for the handle of the bucket. He found it, and uncaring of the contents within, he threw it to the far corner.

The metal clanged and clattered against the stone then fell to the ground. Urine splattered onto the floor.

Sliding down to the floor, Raoul hugged his knees to his chest and exhaled a rattled sigh. Ducking his chin onto his knees, he refused to look away from the shadowed corner. Time did not seem to pass. Exhaustion finally overwhelmed him as the pink light of dawn illuminated the room and he slept.

+++

When Raoul awoke, he was sitting on the floor of his study in Paris. Covered in sweat, he wiped the salty liquid from his eyes. Pressing a thumb into his temple, he glanced around the room with a furrowed brow. Shifting from his uncomfortable position, he pushed to his feet and staggered for balance.

A woman dressed in white scrubbed at the floor in the far corner of the room, but he did not recognize her. Had Christine hired new help? 

Ignoring the servant, he absorbed the familiar atmosphere and smiled. Bookshelves lined the walls, filled with the tomes collected by the de Chagny family over generations. He had read everything in the room multiple times before he turned twenty five, and though he had no interest in them now, he knew that Christine often liked to browse the selections and chose one to read in the gardens. Gustave had grown curious of the books as well, but Raoul had snapped at the young boy one day for knocking over an entire shelf in his attempt to reach a book that was a little too high.

The boy had not returned in the two years since. Frowning, he looked to the door and wondered where Gustave was. Perhaps he could coax his son back into the room and share with him the stories that were always his favorite. Perhaps after supper.

Returning his attention to the shelves, he crossed the familiar distance to the sette and circled it with the intention of lighting the kerosene lamp. When had his study gotten so dark?

He stubbed his toe, and letting out a silent gasp, Raoul jumped backward. His toes curled, and he squeezed his eyes closed as he hissed through the pain. Snarling, he glared, but the anger soon dissipated as he could not spot what furniture was even in the way. A flickering haze obscured his vision, and the room faded between a darkened cell and his familiar study.

With a wince, he rubbed at his brow and closed his eyes a moment to calm the spinning. Once oriented, he looked around the room again, and calmed at the familiar bookshelves. He remembered a story that was one of his favorites when he was a young boy and wondered if maybe Gustave would like it as well.

Ignoring the trembling of his hand, he approached the bookcase in search of the book.

“Monsieur,” a woman’s voice asked from behind him. “What are you doing?”

“I need to find a book,” he replied, not recognizing the speaker. “Leave me be.”

“Monsieur, there is nothing there,” the voice stated with an even tone. “Do you know where you are? Monsieur? Vicomte de Chagny, do you know where you are?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he snapped, glaring back over his shoulder. The room illuminated and at the appearance of the light, the room spun. Reaching out, he fumbled to steady himself. Someone took his arm, and he twitched, shoving away the unrecognized touch. He lashed out at the contact.

The touch retreated, and he heard the door to his study open. There was movement then, though he could not place it. Voices of others in the room melded and merged, and his head rattled with the sound. Hands were on him again, stronger this time and with more purpose.

He struggled against the hold, and that was when he heard it. A taunt so familiar that it haunted his sleep. A voice that was forever etched into his mind.

_“Monsieur! This is indeed an unparalleled delight!”_

Raoul roared, shaking his head viciously. “No! Demon, be gone from here!”

He heard laughing, and the taunts intensified. Louder and with anger, the voices raged in his mind, and he fought back against the hands restraining him. His heart raced, and he gasped for air. He struggled, managing to free himself from whatever hold restrained him.

He threw a punch, at what or who, it did not matter. Pain burst over his knuckles and he knew that he must have connected with whatever he attacked.

In the corner of the room, the same corner where that shadow had retreated not a few hours ago, Raoul saw a walking nightmare. 

A male figure stood motionless, watching him. Slender and wearing a well-tailored suit, the figure swayed rhythmically. He stood nearly as tall as the room, the top of his head mere inches from the ceiling. His legs and arms were long and thin, and the tips of his fingers tapped sporadically at the sides of his knees as if he were playing chords on a piano. His face was featureless except for a single almond-shaped eyesocket, and covering the opposite side of his face was the familiar porcelain mask worn by the man and monster that had haunted his life and his wife for over a decade.

“Fiend!” he called out, lunging for the figure, but it did not react to his attack. Raoul struggled against the hands restraining him, and his arms quaked.

“ _Bravo, Monsieur,”_ the voice taunted again. _“Such a spirited attempt! I’m right here, Monsieur! The Angel of Death! Come now, don’t stop!”_

The figure suddenly leaned forward. His feet did not move, but he seemed to grow and arch across the room, his back brushing the ceiling to loom over the Vicomte.

Raoul stumbled, and his courage faded. His legs gave out, and he crumbled. The terror overwhelmed him, and he cried out. His mind blanked, and the blessed darkness returned.

+++

The rancid smell of sewage and rot infiltrated his lungs, and Raoul struggled against the nauseousness. He stood on the ledge of a cracked stone pathway overlooking the darkened waters of Paris’s underground sewers. A great lake stretched out before him, and he knew he had to cross it. Rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, he dove in.

Surfacing, he gasped at the freezing temperature and clenched his teeth together to prevent their chattering. He swam. Further and further from land he swam with no destination, but he was compelled to push forward. When surrounded only by water, he paused, treading water.

Suddenly, a rope wrapped around his neck and tightened. The rough fibers scraped at his skin, and with a vicious yank, he was dragged under the water. Raoul reached for the rope, desperate to loosen it from his neck, and he fought against the momentum and the water. Pressure intensified in his chest as he struggled helplessly, desperate to escape. Finally, unable to hold his breath any longer, he gasped and fluid filled his lungs.

He flailed against the force that dragged him to the abyss but with no success.

When encased in blackness, the rope yanked him out of the water, and Raoul was surrounded by light. Grabbing at the rope, he tried to slip his fingers between the noose and his throat to alleviate the pressure. The pain in his chest eased, and he squinted against the brightness.

Slowly, the room dimmed. Hands pulled at his arms, tugging free his grip from the rope. Dangling from the noose, he managed to steady his feet beneath him and lifted up onto his toes. Thick leather straps wrapped around his wrists, preventing any further movement though he could not see to what he was attached.

His vision cleared to reveal the phantom’s opera lair. Christine stood between him and the phantom, her back to his plight as she stared down the ghost. He watched helplessly as his wife neared the phantom with hesitant steps, approaching him as one would a wild animal.

She touched the monster’s shoulder and kissed him. It was a kiss laced with fire, need and hunger. Raoul struggled, but it didn’t matter. Eventually, the kiss broke, there was a long and agonizing hesitation. When the phantom took a step, Christine stopped him.

She shook her head and her eyes slid towards Raoul. “Leave him.”

A wicked gleam flickered in the phantom’s eye. “You wish to watch him die? I will give that to you.”

A chuckle slipped from her lips. “He’s worthless. A useless drunk. The least he could offer me after years of disappointment is an entertaining death.”

“Do you hear that, Monsieur?” the ghost taunted. “Such a disappointment.”

“In so many ways,” Christine concurred. “He has said that his hunger and lust for me has never waned, but I have not seen any proof of it in years. His manhood no longer hardens with need.”

“Is that true, Monsieur?” the phantom laughed. “Well, there is no worry now. I can see to Christine’s satisfaction. In every way.”

Helpless, Raoul watched the scene unfold as clothing was torn away, and Christine tumbled to the floor in the arms of the phantom. Hands groped, mouths fused, skin slickened, and bodies collided. 

Raoul closed his eyes, turning away but it did not block the vision. First like man and wife and then like a beast, the phantom claimed her. She moaned for the ghost, writhing under the brutal and harsh joining. Christine loved every moment.

Fingers curled into the flesh of his shoulders, and Raoul screamed. Crying out to God or anyone who would listen to end the torment. The darkness returned, offering a reprieve that he craved, and the last thing he saw before succumbing to its peace was rapturous wonder on Christine’s face.


	10. Chapter 10

Christine tightened her hold on Raoul’s shoulders as he struggled against her and the restraints that bound his limbs to the bed. He screamed again, yelling unintelligible words, and no matter what she did, she could not awaken him from whatever nightmare haunted his mind. 

“Don’t touch him, Madame,” a stern voice commanded from the doorway. “It will make his terrors worse.”

“What’s happening to him?” Christine asked, stepping back from her husband though she yearned to try and comfort him.

“Nightmares,” Sister Marie-Agnes replied. “Terrible ones. Those suffered by recovering drunkards are nightmares of the likes I have seen in no other. They lash out and attack, as if descending down a river of chaos. Trying to wake them up only exacerbates their horror. They fight harder, strike out, and attack. And often when they wake up, they cannot remember what happened. Their bodies are seized with adrenaline, and they can be wild and inconsolable, but they have no memory of the nightmare.”

Fearful, Christine pressed her fingers to her mouth and shook her head. “What can I do?”

“Nothing now,” the nun answered. “Sometimes, if we can break the nightmare before it comes on, they can sleep peacefully. But once they are in the throes of the terror, we can do nothing but watch.”

“Mother.”

Frantic, Christine spun to the door and moved to block the sight of Raoul’s torment from her son. “Gustave, what did I tell you!”

“I don’t care,” Gustave snapped back and stomped his foot on the floor. “You weren’t here when he was possessed. You weren't here. I was. You were with  _ him. _ I was here with Father, and I got him help. I got Sister Marie-Agnes. So I want to be here with him now when Father needs me. Just go back to  _ him. _ I can help Father without you.”

Christine watched as her son’s eyes slid to focus on Raoul’s torments, and she saw the hesitation and uncertainty flickering within his gaze. Despite Gustave’s bold declarations, he was obviously terrified and unsure of what to do.

Exasperated, Christened sighed. “We have discussed this. If I don’t work, we will starve. I perform every night to put food on your plate and give you a bed to sleep in.”

Angered, Gustave glared at his mother. “You don’t have to work for him. You could do anything else, but you won’t. And Sister Marie-Agnes and Father Rossi wouldn’t let us starve or go cold.”

Christine gestured behind her. “Your Father is admitted to this institution, and his care is administered through the charity of the Church. It is not right for us to seek more than that. I am capable of working, and so I sing. That is my craft, Gustave, and I practice it. I have no intention of seeking money any other way. My options are limited.”

Gustave pointed a finger at her. “They are limited because you choose to limit them.”

Christine masked the hurt at her son’s accusations and observations. He was far too young to know what other work women of Christine’s occupation often employed in order to make ends meet, and she hoped to be able to avoid the fate that befell her one-time friend, Meg Giry. 

She had never seen this kind of anger and instability in Gustave before, and a niggling worry returned. Though Raoul had fallen victim to anger while he succumbed to drink, he rarely, if ever, directed that anger at her. And in the end, if she had to describe the traits possessed by Raoul de Chagny before his drunkenness, anger was not in the top twenty.

“You are too young,” she whispered.

“You always say that!” He continued and took an aggressive step towards his Mother. “I’m old enough to understand a lot of things. Like that you should have wiped the paint off of your face before coming here.”

“Monsieur Gustave!” Sister Marie-Agnes snapped, startling the boy and breaking the tension of his anger. “Recite for me now the Fourth Commandment. Thou shalt …” and with an expectant brow, she waited.

Ducking his head, Gustave muttered. “Honor thine Father and thine Mother.”

“And what are you not doing?” the nun asked.

He remained silent. Tension tightened the tendons of his neck.

Christine turned from him to look at Raoul and was surprised to see her husband watching her, lucid. Panting, his body quaked, covered in sweat. He struggled against the restraints but there was not much effort behind his attempts. Dazed, his expression danced between uncertainty, anger and then fear. He looked away from her, and his eyes darted between a corner of the room and the window where a wooden board blocked all natural light.

“I asked you a question, Monsieur,” Sister Marie-Agnes said again.

“You don’t understand,” Gustave replied. “You don’t know what she did. You don’t know why my Father is sick.”

“Your Mother did not force a drink into your Father’s hand,” Sister Marie-Agnes stated. “Unless he was tied to a bed and force fed for years, the decision to drink was his and his alone. As for what your Mother may or may not have done, none of us are without sin. That is why we are unworthy of God’s presence and must constantly atone for our weaknesses. If we were without sin, well then we would be Christ, for he is forever without sin.”

“She doesn’t atone,” Gustave said. “She’s not even sorry for what she did. I know what she did.”

“And your Mother’s atonement or lack thereof is not your concern,” Sister Marie-Agnes said, clipping off anything else Gustave would say. “Her sins are between her and the Lord, and you are in no position to judge her. You may pray for guidance and for her soul, but not attack her unless you are perfect and without sin. Tell me then, young Monsieur, are you without sin?”

Christine felt every accusation from her son as if it were a scourging. His anger permeated the room, and she watched as the energy seemed to feed Raoul’s paranoia. Her husband twitched in the bed, his gaze fixed on the corner of the room.

“Stop laughing!” Raoul yelled, interrupting the heated conversation between the nun and Gustave. “It’s not funny. Stop it!”

“Father!” Gustave rushed around the nun to stand at Raoul’s bedside but was unsure what to do. When Christine approached, Gustave leaned over Raoul and shoved at his Mother’s hand. “Don’t touch him!”

Frantic, Raoul fought his restraints, and at the brush of Gustave’s coat against his skin, he roared. “Get away! Don’t touch me! Get them off of me! Get them off!”

Gustave jumped back, the fear obvious in his eyes.

“What did you do?” Raoul yelled, turning his gaze to Gustave and then the corner of the room. Despite the direction of his focus, his eyes were glazed. His pupils dilated. “Get them off!”

Christine circled the bed and took her son in his arms; he didn’t fight her, trembling. She hushed him, kissed his temple and eased him behind her. Extending her hands, she neared Raoul’s bed. “Raoul. Raoul, can you hear me? There is nothing there.”

“Be careful, Madame,” Sister Marie Agnes warned.

Christine looked towards the door and noted that not only was the nun watching her with caution but so was Father Kopanski. When Raoul struggled again, her eyes shifted back to her husband.

Father Kopanski warned in Norwegian. “The delirium is very real to him. He may barely register that you are there. You and your son should leave for the night.”

“Not while he is so distressed,” Christine replied in Swedish. “I can’t leave him. I can’t.” When she touched Raoul, he jumped and blew air through pursed lips onto his arm.

“Gustave, come here,” Christine commanded, and without looking away from Raoul, tugged the gloves off her hands. She saw Gustave out of the corner of her eye and handed him the gloves. His hands trembled when he took them from her.

Raoul spoke then, but the words were unintelligible. She reached for her husband again, this time taking his arm with a firm touch. She leaned closer as he continued to struggle. “Raoul, can you hear me? This is just me. It’s just me. It’s Christine. Can you hear me? You have nothing to fear. Hear me, my Love. Please.”

But Raoul seemed unable to hear her, entirely lost in whatever hallucinations haunted his mind. Detached from reality, he mumbled nonsense, struggling and lashing against his binds. Taking the sheet, she wiped the sweat from his chest; he fought her touch and so she stopped.

Tears pricked at her eyes, and defeated, she ducked her head onto his shoulder. “Oh, Raoul.” Her hand rested on the center of his chest, and she closed her eyes.

Muttering, he inhaled. Slow and deep, he breathed, and though his heart raced, he stilled. Turning towards her, he inhaled again.

Noting his changing focus, Christine eased closer still. Her hold on him tightened. “Raoul, can you hear me? I’m here.”

“Madame,” Father Kopanski beckoned with a wave of the hand. “Come to the other side of the bed. Whatever agitates him is in that corner. Come here. Yes, right here.” He dragged the chair to the other side for her.

Christine sat, putting her hands on Raoul again. He leaned closer to her, his eyes still on that corner, and he tried to put himself between his wife and whatever lurked on that side of the room. His head tilted back, and his eyes fluttered as he inhaled again. An indistinguishable utterance slipped from his lips.

She smiled, rubbing his chest with a slow and circular motion. “Yes, Raoul. I’m here. It’s safe. There is nothing there.” And then she sang for him, a hushed and familiar song from their youth.

When the song was finished and comfortable silence lingered in the air, he sighed, “Lotte.”

“Raoul,” she cried, moving closer to bury her face in his throat.

He tugged at his restraints, but when they did not give way, he relaxed. “Angel of Music? Truly? That was your choice?”

Though she smiled, she let out a choked sob, and her hand slid up his chest to cup his jaw. “I’m sorry. I thought a song from our childhood would soothe you.”

“Your voice always soothes me,” he husked. 

With his name on her tongue, she pressed her lips to his ear and then his jaw.

“Christine …”

Her hand cupped his cheek and her lips sealed to his. He was still as if in shock a moment before his lips pursed against hers, and for what felt like a long time, she did not pull away..

When she finally let their lips part, his tongue tasted what lingered of her. Shaking his head, he said, “You can’t stay here. You have to leave. They’ll get you. They want you.”

With her thumb, she wiped the red stain from his lips. “Who wants me?”

He yanked at the restraints, gesturing to the corner of the room with his head. “Those … things. They’re gone now. Didn’t you see them? They’ll come back. They always come back. Christine, untie me. I have to protect you.”

“Be still,” Christine whispered, stroking her hand over his chest in an attempt to calm him. “I’m safe, Raoul. There is nothing there. There was nothing there.”

Distressed, his eyes focused on hers. “They were! I saw them, Christine. I saw them. Shadows. They are shadows, but not just shadows. I saw them!”

“No, my Love. You didn’t. It was just a dream.”

“It was no dream,” he snapped and shook his head. “Years ago, you told me that you saw a ghost, and I believed you. I believed you, Christine. On the rooftop of the opera house, I believed you.”

A tear slipped from her eye, and she nodded. “I know you did. I believe you saw them, Raoul. These shadows.” Saddened, she ducked her head to his chest and closed her eyes. “I believe you.”

She felt his chest rumble when he spoke. “Christine, why is there a priest in our bed chambers? And why are you crying? I feel your tears.”

She sniffed, and her nails curled against the slickened skin of his chest. “I’m frightened, Raoul. We aren’t in our bed chambers. We are in a clinic in New York City. Do you remember why we are here?”

He thrashed. “You have to go. They’re coming. Go! Leave me!”

Christine called his name once and then again in an attempt to draw his attention back to her. Cupping his cheek, she guided him to face her yet his eyes never abandoned the corner of the room.

“You have to go,” he pleaded. “You have to leave now. Gustave? What are you doing here? Take your mother and go! Why aren’t you listening to me? Leave them alone! Stay back, Phantom of Darkness! You have no place here!”

Despite his brave words, Raoul trembled with fear, and Christine could not calm him. She startled when hands grabbed her shoulders, steadying her. Father Kopanski coaxed her to stand. “Please, Madame, let me escort you to your hotel.”

“There is nothing more you can do for him,” Sister Marie Agnes concurred. “This is a battle he must fight alone.”

Reluctant, she stepped back from her husband and nodded. “I understand. I just want to help him. Raoul? Raoul, please, come back.”

“I know,” Father Kopanski said. “But he cannot. Come. Right now, there is nothing you can do. When the delirium passes, he will need you then. But right now, he no longer even knows you are here.”

Resigned, she turned from Raoul to exit the room. Stopping at the door, she peered back over her shoulder and called for her son. Though he initially set his jaw and held her gaze, whatever he saw in Christine’s expression caused him to avert his eyes and obediently follow her from the room.

+++

The walk from the clinic to the hotel was relatively uninteresting. Gustave barely acknowledged his mother’s presence and Father Kopanski offered no reprieve through conversation. On occasion, he would glance at the young boy with a thoughtful expression. 

Carefully guiding them across the gas-lit street, the priest finally spoke. “So how does one go about getting a ticket for your performance?”

“One purchases it as they do any other performance,” she answered. “There is a box office near the main stage. Why?”

“Because I am hoping to see you perform,” the priest said.

“Oh? Are you certain of that? I am performing as part of a vaudeville act. I was not under the impression that kind of performance was condoned by the Church.”

Father Kopanski shrugged. “There are a lot of things not condoned by the Church. It doesn’t mean we all should turn our back on it, does it?”

“You are the man of the cloth. Tell me.”

“You are an intelligent woman. I doubt you are ignorant to how the world views you. Much less the Church.”

“And what about you, Father?” she asked. “What do you think of me and my family? For as you say, I am not ignorant to what the world thinks of me or my husband. Rumor has followed us from the beginning.”

“What do I think,” the priest said. “Rumor matters little to me, though I must admit to a curiosity about what kind of rumors you speak of. From what I have witnessed, I think that you are a devoted and loving wife and mother with a spine of steel. You are also likely a gifted performer if you have been invited here to New York to sing when there are many performers just as capable here in America. What more rumor should there be than that?”

When Christine remained quiet to his question, he asked, “Why did you never teach your son Swedish?”

“There was no need,” Christine replied. “Though I wish now that we had him taught English instead of Italian.”

“And do you speak Italian as well?”

“I do,” Christine answered and smiled. “I’m an Opera singer, Father. I would be a disgrace to my profession if I did not. This is our hotel here. Will you wait here a moment, please? I have something I would like you to bring back to the clinic for my husband.”

“Of course.”

She led Gustave upstairs. When she opened the door to their room, he pushed inside and entered the small room that was his. Without a word, he closed the door behind him, shutting her out.

Sighing, she picked up a small perfume bottle on the nightstand near the bed and returned downstairs to the priest. She handed him the vial. “Will you take this for my husband? He seemed to find some peace when I was near. I have worn this perfume for almost two years now. I changed it when the one I used to wear was … well, it doesn’t matter. I didn’t think he had even noticed.”

Lifting her hand, she stepped back and smiled. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to … nevermind.”

“I don’t mind,” the priest said. “Marriage is a constant journey. Not that I would know from experience, but so I’ve been told.”

“It is a constant journey,” Christine replied. “And, for me at least, unexpected. But worth it. Thank you, by the way. For what you have done for my family, especially my husband and my son. We do not deserve your charity, but we are grateful for it nonetheless.”

“Everyone deserves charity, Madame,” the priest said. “Especially those who feel they don’t deserve it. Have a good night.”

“Yes, good night.”


	11. Chapter 11

Christine did not know how long she stayed in the chapel that rainy morning, but only knew that she had found a renewed solace in her recent return to God. For so long, she equated the traumas of her youth with the blind devotion of her faith, as if they were in any way connected. Which was, of course, ridiculous.

And yet, a guilt weighed upon her. For how could she return to Christ while the chains of sin bound her. 

“May I pray with you?”

With her eyes still closed, Christine smiled. “You did not ask yesterday. Since when does a priest need my permission to pray?”

Father Kopanski chuckled and knelt in the pew across the aisle from her. He crossed himself, clasped his hands to his chest, and ducked his head in prayer.

Exhaling a slow sigh, Christine glanced across the aisle. “Father?”

“Hmm?”

“Will my husband survive?”

His eyes opened and he looked up at the tabernacle. “What he experiences now is dangerous and deadly. From what I have seen, nearly half of those with your husband’s condition do not live through their trials. And those that do, may have long term complications.”

“Complications? Like what?”

“There is a lot that we still do not know, medically that is, not spiritually about the long term and true effects of alcohol addiction on the body. But medically speaking, he could suffer from sleeplessness, mood swings, general fatigue, trouble concentrating, perhaps even remembering things. He could even seem like a different person than the man you remembered. And that is only what I have observed.”

“And what of his body?”

“Unknown damages,” the priest replied. “The disease — and it is a disease despite what some of my colleagues here may believe — unleashes havoc on the body. Early death, bone brittleness. Infertility. I am not a medical doctor and there is much we are still learning, but that is what I have witnessed, though my observations are anecdotal, at best. And alcoholics will also face blame for their weakness and struggles, a label that could follow them. Others will judge harshly with no deference to the fact that they may have turned away from their addiction.”

“As to the fault of the inebriated,” the priest continued, “that is up for debate. Is it your husband’s fault, is it because of other underlying conditions? Frankly, I don’t care for the debate. I, and many of us here, wish to heal the victim. Personally, I’m not in the business of placing blame. Christ never blamed the sinner who repented. Why should we then vilify the drunkard who wishes to abstain?”

Christine tucked her chin to her shoulder to hide her face from the priest. Her eyes burned. When the priest remained silent, she said, “I love my husband desperately. I don’t want this fate to befall him.”

“It is not a question of want,” the priest said. “We are beyond that stage now.”

“I know,” she replied, resigned. “We have wasted this past decade, he and I, and now that I finally see him again, I may lose him before I can show him that.”

The priest did not respond to her words, but instead closed his eyes in prayer. And for quite some time, they stayed like that together, joined by spiritual reflection and introspective meditation within a holy place.

It was Christine who spoke first. “Father? I … Would you take confession?”

His eyes opened and he turned his head to look at her. “Of course. I am always here to act as the Lord’s ear for his children.”

Father Kopanski stood from the pew and genuflected before the altar. He climbed the stairs and picked up a rickety, small wooden stool that was hidden behind the lectern. Taking the pristinely folded green stole on the altar, he approached her and set the stool in front of her.

He smiled and sat, his knees pulled high to his chest. His head ducked, and he tied the stole around his head, blocking his sight. Folding his hands in his lap, he waited.

“That’s a bit theatrical,” she teased. “Is it not?”

His smile broadened and he shrugged. “I thought you would appreciate the overly dramatic.” At her soft chuckle, he sobered. “Many feel more comfortable knowing that we are blind to the sinner and are only here to absolve the sin.”

Christine was quiet for a long few minutes as she gathered her thoughts and her courage. Father Kopanski did not pressure her or seem to show any impatience at her hesitancy. Crossing herself again, she held her clasped hands close and shifted on the wooden kneeler. “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been … years since my last confession.”

She waited for some kind of judgement or condemnation, but when none came and the response was a short prayer followed by silence, she sighed. “I’m sorry, Father, I … I don’t even know how to start.”

“Wherever you wish,” the priest replied.

Christine ducked her head and pressed her clasped hands to her brow. “It’s all so complicated and messy. Confusing. It’s been ten years since it happened, and I still don’t understand what happened. No, not what. How.”

“You don’t need to elaborate any details,” Father Kopanski said. “The Lord knows all. The Act of Confession is meant as a self actualization. It is our own acknowledgement of sin. Mistakes. And then we come to the Lord seeking forgiveness.”

“Hmmf, mistakes,” she scoffed and shook her head. “Not every sin is a mistake. Or even a sin. It doesn’t feel like a sin.”

“And how would you define sin?”

Christine thought of that a moment, her brow furrowed in concentration. Finally, she replied, “An affront to the Lord.”

“And this act or thought that weighs on you so much that you sought the sacrament of penance, is it an affront to the Lord?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered and with a grunt, she shook her head. “It shouldn’t be.”

Turning her eyes to the splintered wooden crucifix affixed to the wall behind the altar, she continued. “My Father died when I was young; my Mother well before that. He was my true confidant, a guiding light, my support and foundation. And then suddenly, he was gone. He taught me music and poetry and philosophy. He taught me to swim and about all the birds in the sky. He always loved their song. He loved my voice, and nurtured my talent. He taught me to sing.”

She smiled at the memory, lost in the thoughts of her childhood. “We were not destitute, but we certainly were not settled. He was a gifted violinist, but he sometimes struggled to find consistent work. Teaching was his great joy, and when he had patrons, we were quite comfortable. Modest, but comfortable.”

“I had met Raoul during one such comfortable time period,” she added. “We were children at the time. He, a boy of only fourteen, and I, a bit younger. That summer seemed magical. Ah, we grew to be fast friends, he and I. And Father told us all manner of stories and myths, cultivating our creativity and curiosity. It was the happiest summer of my life. By autumn, Raoul had left and it was just Father and I, like it had been for most of my memorable life.”

Her smile faded. “And then suddenly, he was gone. My father was gone, and all of that light was gone with him. He had shielded me from so much, and without his presence and protection, all the harshness and coldness of the world engulfed me. I sank into sadness, surrounded by unknowns and uncertainty. We were in Paris at the time, and a family took me in. One of Father’s patrons.”

Father Kopanski tilted his head as he listened. “How frightened you must have been.”

“I was,” Christine admitted. “I joined the Paris Conservatory to train in Opera, in singing. But as the years passed, my passion for that one thing that joined me to the memory of my father had faded. I was so alone and so young. That’s when he came to me.”

“Who was he?” the priest asked.

“An angel,” she whispered then shook her head. “No, no that’s not true. But at the time, he was an angel. The song you heard me sing to my husband, it was a song my Father taught me as a child, both Raoul and I. My Father sang of an Angel of Music who would look over me, come to me when he was gone and guide me. This voice, this being that came to me while I mourned in a graveyard at my Father’s headstone was exactly what my Father had foretold.”

“I latched onto him,” Christine explained. “This voice that sang to me and then inspired my voice again when it had all but been extinguished. And just like that, without even laying eyes upon him, the loneliness and the cold faded. For some time it was like that, he and I. A voice from the beyond that grew more strict and controlling, yet I did not seem to care. The music called to me. His music, it ...”

“It what?”

“It was exhilarating. He was exhilarating.”

When she paused, Father Kopanski spoke. “Even though you had never seen him? You were not suspicious?”

She chuckled. “I was naïve. Young and foolish and so lonely. I can look back on it now and see the way he manipulated me, but it did not feel that way in the moment. For so long, I yearned to see him. To see the angel sent to me by my Father. I suppose it sounds so foolish now.”

“I don’t think you were foolish,” the priest said. “As you said yourself, you were yearning for comfort, for belonging, and for the Father that left you too soon. This being filled that void.”

“He did,” she admitted. “He was so controlling, even as only a voice, I obeyed him. It was like I was ensorcelled, enchanted. I could not resist his music. His call. When I finally reunited with Raoul again, it was within moments of that reintroduction that the angel showed himself to me. And I willingly followed him to the abyss, leaving Raoul and this world behind.”

Her smile faded and her stare blanked, focusing on nothing particular though her gaze never wavered from the altar. “His was a world of darkness. Of mystery and allure. It called to me. It still does.”

“And you could not resist,” the priest concluded. “You submitted to temptation.”

“Not physically,” she said with a slow shake of the head. “Not then, no. It was something spiritual. Like kindred souls. Star crossed or perhaps even fated. Hmmf, it sounds somewhat silly now that I say it like that, but that is truly how I felt at the time. It was not lust or dreams of romance. It was something so much more.”

Pensive, she reflected on that a long moment before adding, “At least for me. Even in my terror, I was still drawn to him. Even after he was exposed as a murderer. An obsessive, manipulative, dangerous, and violent man who let nothing hinder the possession of his desire. In this case, that was me.”

“Yet, it didn’t matter,” she said and scoffed. “He kidnapped me, terrified me, tried to own me, mold me, groom me and yet, I still pitied him. He was terribly deformed, you see, shunned at birth by his mother and society at large for the rest of his life. Mocked, vilified and condemned for something that was of no fault of his own. A human who was not valued for his intelligence and talents but was scorned because of his appearance. I pitied the man who craved companionship, affection, and acceptance. I could not fault him for that, or for feeling betrayed when he learned of my love for Raoul. This man who gave of himself to train my voice, to comfort me and pull me from despair and loneliness. I understand why he lashed out in pain.”

The priest leaned back on the stool, and his hands unclasped to rest on his thighs. “So your gravest sin is that of compassion, even for one who could be labeled an enemy.”

“No, Father,” Christine said. “My gravest sin is that after all of this happened and much worse, after Raoul and I were free of his grasp and able to move on together, I was compelled to seek out my teacher one last time.”

She fiddled with the diamond ring on her left hand. “I sought him out the night before my wedding. I don’t know why. I don’t know what I was hoping to find. Perhaps to know that the mob that hunted him had not killed him. I wanted away from him, you see, and I wanted freedom. I wanted Raoul, and I wanted … I don’t know, the foolishness of young love and wishful promises. And hope. Most of all, I wanted hope and comfort. A life without fear.”

Her hand flicked with a sarcastic gesture and she smirked. “So much for a life without fear or discomfort.” The amusement faded. “That night, when I found him on a moonless night in the bowels of an abandoned building, I betrayed the man I had promised to love. The man that I would marry the next day. With the symbol of his love on a chain around my neck, I succumbed to whatever it was that drew me to him.”

Ducking her head, she rubbed her brow. “I don’t know why. It was not my intention. It just happened. I was so lost in that moment that I was ready to throw everything away to chase this man into darkness. I think … I think that it was because I felt like that was where I belonged. How could I ever be a wife to a Vicomte? How could I ever deserve what Raoul offered when a part of me yearned for the forbidden darkness? And yes, Raoul was my childhood friend, but even as children, well, I was not naive to the mutterings of the odd friendship between a violinist’s daughter and the youngest de Chagny. It only magnified in our adulthood.”

“You speak as if you feel you did not deserve love or happiness,” the priest noted. “Just because we are tempted by sin or even succumb to its temptations does not mean we are lost for eternity.”

“Aren’t I?” she asked. “Father, I laid with a man who was not my betrothed on the day before my wedding. I don’t regret it. I can’t. I can’t regret that moment. He had never known any kind of love before. He had never known a tender touch, or a gentle glance. Nothing. He had given so much to me, and I cared for him. How could I not care for him as well? I … I still can’t bring myself to regret sharing this intimacy with him. Which makes the guilt so much worse because of how it hurts Raoul. And now Gustave. Ah, Gustave.”

“He knows? Your son?”

“Yes,” she answered. “I was never going to tell him the possibility. That I could never say with certainty who his father is. I intended to keep the truth from him and from Raoul until my death. It seems that fate would not be so kind.”

“A lie by omission is still just that,” the priest said. “Your marriage and family were built upon a foundation that had been cracked by the weight of your guilt and choices thereafter. That is not to say that your husband came to you without fault and sin. But the combination threatened to shatter your relationship before it even had a chance to thrive. Only now, in honesty can you begin a journey forward, together in the grace of God.”

Whispering, Christine shook her head. “I do not deserve such grace.”

Father Kopanski smiled. “Do any of us truly deserve God’s grace? No. We are all sinners and unworthy of his presence, yet our Father loves us anyway. Sins, warts, and all.”

“But a sin like this?”

“Yes, even a sin like this,” Father Kopanski said. “All sins. He knows that we are not perfect, and he loves us anyway. That is the beauty of God’s grace. It is the very definition of unconditional love. It is the love that I see within your family. Your husband is an abusive drunkard who drove a wedge between himself and both you and your son, and whose continuing descent into drunken maddeness exasperated an already tenuous situation. You have betrayed the very fundamental trust that is supposed to be the foundation of holy matrimony, not just through an affair, but with the lies that perpetuated its secrecy. And your son rages out against you in his impotence in facing a situation that he is still yet incapable of truly understanding.”

“Yet the love is there,” the priest continued. “It is palpable. There are so many wretches on this earth who live life without knowing that kind of love. Do not let it slip through your fingers because you live in the past. Move beyond your sins and your husband’s to forge something new. Something stronger. And do not let go.”

Ducking her head, Christine whispered, “What if I cannot escape the past?”

“We are all haunted by ghosts,” Father Kopanski said. “Some of the past, and some in the present. There are even ghosts that have not yet come, but they are in our path, waiting for our arrival. We must face them and sometimes carry them. The test of this life is to not let their haunting weigh us down, but to use these experiences for growth. Lean upon your faith for strength. God is here for all who seek his guidance and help. He is your cornerstone, and he wants to be if you will let him.”

At her silence, he said, “I know it is difficult.”

Huffing, Christine shook her head and looked away from the priest. “Hmmf, you would never understand the weight I bear, Father.”

“Mmm, but I do,” he replied and though Christine looked at him with surprise, he could not see her reaction. “I speak from experience. I understand guilt. Guilt and dishonesty. Temptation. And how these build upon each other until you are suffocating under the weight. And sometimes, we finally succumb.”

They sat in silence for a long many moments, and the priest did not pressure or question her. Clearing her throat, Christine admitted with laced humor. “I have missed mass more times than I can count.”

Father Kopanski smirked at the attempt to shatter the building tension. “I see. And are you at least repentant for that?”

“I am,” Christine said. “Though I know I blamed my career for staying away, that wasn’t true. I could have found time. I think, well, I think I placed this deified idealism on this man, this angel for so many years. As if through God’s grace, he comforted and guided me. When that world shattered, I turned away from all of it. What God would let the world treat this man with such viciousness? What God would sacrifice me to his whims? What had I done to deserve that fate? What God would let me fall prey to the tendrils of madness and pain, to create me in such a way that I crave a darkness I do not understand? Why would he show me a glimpse of hope and warmth only to let me poison the well from which I drink?”

“I would never presume to speak to God’s plan,” the priest said. “Nor would I assume that I were capable of understanding his will. What I can say, is that I plainly see that you feel you are unworthy of love, of forgiveness, of acceptance. I can tell you that is entirely untrue. You suffer in pain, in regret, perhaps not of your actions, but of their inevitable consequences. We live our lives as is God’s plan. Fate, if you prefer, is not something that is deserved, but simply is. And you have so much to be thankful for in this world. Small gifts of God’s grace that are present right now.”

Christine closed her eyes and rubbed her brow. “I should not complain so. There are so many others who are suffering so much more than I.”

“Perhaps,” the priest replied. “But that does not make your trial any less burdensome. Do you have any other sins or perceived sins you wish to confess?”

She shook her head.

After a prayer, the priest gestured towards the altar. “Your penance is to attend mass on Sunday. It matters not which church you choose, but simply that you attend.”

Clasping her hands, Christine ducked her head. “I understand. And?”

“And nothing. That is all.”

Shocked, Christine jerked back. “What? That cannot be all. I am prepared to serve my penance, Father.”

“And you shall,” the priest said. “By attending mass on Sunday.”

“But there must be more.”

“There is,” the priest replied. “That penance is not for you to bear. You have carried many crosses over these years, my child. It is now time for you to shed those burdens.”

“But Father …”

Father Kopanski turned towards Christine, and even with the blindfold in place, it was still as if he stared, unphased. “Your prayers are added to mine. To absolve both our souls of sins, so shall I bear your burden until our sins are absolved by the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Overwhelmed, she wept in silence, and Christine ducked her head again, muttering her thanks. Her heart ached, and her mind resisted the possibilities of a life free of torments and regrets.

The priest reached for her, laying a gentle hand on her coiffed hair. “Go now in peace with the full forgiveness and blessings of our Lord. May you find peace and joy in his presence and may he bless your house, your home, and your family. Feel the weight lifted from your breast, for no longer is this burden yours to carry. Release it unto our Lord, Jesus Christ. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”

Christine trembled, wiping the tears from her cheek. “Why would you do this?”

Reaching back, the priest untied the cloth that covered his eyes. “Because I understand regret. I understand confusion and torment and pain. You were drowning under the weight of your chains, unable to cast them away to heal. I am used to the weight of a great many things, and I myself owe a great penance for my sins. I wish to add yours to mine, so that I may pray for both our souls, and we may find peace on our diverging paths in his name.”

“Father …”

“Go now, child,” Father Kopanski coaxed and ducked his head, folding his hand in prayer.    
Go in peace and with God’s grace.”

The priest said nothing more. Though he asked no penance of prayer from her, she stayed and prayed with him.


End file.
